Google then had complete regret not doing this with ECC RAM: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14206811
It got them to where they need to be to then worry about ECC. This is like the dudes who deploy their blog on kubernetes just in case it hits front page of new york times or something.
A great version of this and how ex-DEC engineers saved Google and their choice of ECC RAM - inventing MapReduce and BigTable https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IK0I4f8Rbis