Thursday, June 25th 2009
Rambus Demonstrates Superior Power Efficiency of World's Fastest Memory
Rambus Inc., one of the world's premier technology licensing companies specializing in high-speed memory architectures, today showcased a silicon demonstration of a complete XDR memory system running at data rates up to 7.2Gbps with superior power efficiency. This silicon demonstration consists of Elpida's recently-announced 1Gb XDR DRAM device and an XIO memory controller transmitting realistic data patterns. The XIO memory controller is up to 3.5 times more power efficient than a GDDR5 controller, and the total memory system can provide up to two times more bandwidth than GDDR5 at equivalent power. In addition, the XIO memory controller demonstrated bi-modal operation with support for both XDR DRAM as well as next-generation XDR2 DRAM.
"Future graphics and multi-core processors require significantly higher memory performance under extremely challenging power and thermal constraints," said Martin Scott, senior vice president of Research and Technology Development at Rambus. "This technology demonstration highlights the outstanding power efficiency of the XDR and XDR2 memory architectures at performance levels from 3.2 to 7.2Gbps with scalability to well over 10Gbps."
This silicon demonstration, shown at Denali MemCon 2009 in San Jose, is the first implementation supporting the XDR memory architecture roadmap incorporating innovations developed as part of Rambus' Terabyte Bandwidth Initiative. Implemented in the bi-modal XIO memory controller for XDR2 operation, these innovations include:
With these capabilities, the XDR and XDR2 memory architectures are scalable across a broad range of performance appropriate for multi-core computing, graphics, gaming, and consumer electronics. The XDR memory architecture has already been adopted in products including the Sony PLAYSTATION 3 computer entertainment system, DLP projectors, Teradici PC-over-IP computing systems, and Toshiba's Qosmio laptop PCs and HDTV chip sets.
Source:
Rambus
"Future graphics and multi-core processors require significantly higher memory performance under extremely challenging power and thermal constraints," said Martin Scott, senior vice president of Research and Technology Development at Rambus. "This technology demonstration highlights the outstanding power efficiency of the XDR and XDR2 memory architectures at performance levels from 3.2 to 7.2Gbps with scalability to well over 10Gbps."
This silicon demonstration, shown at Denali MemCon 2009 in San Jose, is the first implementation supporting the XDR memory architecture roadmap incorporating innovations developed as part of Rambus' Terabyte Bandwidth Initiative. Implemented in the bi-modal XIO memory controller for XDR2 operation, these innovations include:
- Fully Differential Memory Architecture (FDMA) - enhances signal integrity and increases performance through point-to-point differential signaling of clock, data, and command/address (C/A), an industry first;
- FlexLink C/A - reduces pin count and increases scalability; and
- Enhanced FlexPhase - enables the world's highest memory signaling rates while simplifying routing and board design.
- Micro-threading of the DRAM core - introduced by Rambus in early 2005, increases data transfer efficiency and reduces power consumption; and
- 16X Data Rate - allows for extremely high data rates with the use of a relatively low-speed system clock.
With these capabilities, the XDR and XDR2 memory architectures are scalable across a broad range of performance appropriate for multi-core computing, graphics, gaming, and consumer electronics. The XDR memory architecture has already been adopted in products including the Sony PLAYSTATION 3 computer entertainment system, DLP projectors, Teradici PC-over-IP computing systems, and Toshiba's Qosmio laptop PCs and HDTV chip sets.
19 Comments on Rambus Demonstrates Superior Power Efficiency of World's Fastest Memory
Then again... I don't think rambus is going for the consumer market - i doubt they will be releasing XDR sticks or that we will be seeing XDR motherboards anytime soon. This is probably just for manufactureres.
Read the whole article, so you know which part of it we are talking about. :toast: We're basically saying that graphics and consumer electronics are really the target markets, as XDR is cost prohibitive as a competitor for DDR3 and consumer multi-core computing.
I estimate that if it cost even 1.25 times more, nobody would have bought it.
SETI researcher: "Hmm.. how many more PCs can I hook up?"
Student: "What about a system using RAMBUS memory instead?"
SETI dude: "Nah. 1 system + RAMBUS = the cost of 4 PCs"
Price makes RAMBUS impractical.
I don't think XDR is an expensive standard. If it was, Sony wouldn't have opted for it against competitive DRAM standards (for use in PS3) or the several other products that use XDR. In the market, price fractions as small as 0.1 (10%) can tilt the deals in favour of either standards, when sourcing of raw materials. Presuming such a small price difference exists, Rambus can play the performance/price card and emerge as a viable option or standard.
I think what it really comes down to is this:
-DDR has strength in numbers with dual-, tri- and quad- channel memory controllers and the possibility to go even higher (especially with FB-DIMM). This makes sense because DDR2 is/was cheap.
-In new computers and servers, you always want at least 1 GiB and most computers ship with at least 2 GiB.
-XDR is found in devices, like the PS3, with 512 MiB or less memory--very low densities. I can't think of a single application where XDR used exceeds 1 GiB.
-XDR can achieve higher bandwidth without many chips/sticks.
XDR, therefore, is cost effective when you don't need much memory and the memory you do have has to be fast (e.g. HDTV devices, PS3, etc.). DDR3/GDDR4 makes sense when you need a lot of memory. Because video cards are moving into 2 GiB VRAM territory, video cards are already out of the market for XDR. Vista doesn't like any less than 2 GiB either so your average computer is also out of the market for XDR.