Rambus, a company that has veered around the line of being an innovative company and a patent troll, has shed some more light on what can be expected from HBM3 memory (when it's finally available). In an investor meeting, representatives from the company shared details regarding HBM3's improvements over HBM2. Details are still scarce, but at least we know Rambus' expectations for the technology: double the memory bandwidth per stack when compared to HBM2 (4000 MB/s), and a more complex design, which leaves behind the 2.5D design due to increased height of the HBM3 memory stacks. An interesting thing to note is that Rambus is counting on HBM3 to be produced on 7 nm technologies. Considering the overall semiconductor manufacturing calendar for the 7 nm process, this should place HBM3 production in 2019, at the earliest.

HBM3 is also expected to bring much lower power consumption compared to HBM2, besides increasing memory density and bandwidth. However, the "complex design architectures" in the Rambus slides should give readers pause. HBM2 production has had some apparent troubles in reaching demand levels, with suspected lower yields than expected being the most likely culprit. Knowing the trouble AMD has had in successful packaging of HBM2 memory with the silicon interposer and its own GPUs, an even more complex implementation of HBM memory in HBM3 could likely signal some more troubles in that area - maybe not just for AMD, but for any other takers of the technology. Here's hoping AMD's woes were due only to one-off snags on their packaging partners' side, and doesn't spell trouble for HBM's implementation itself.

DDR5, the natural successor to today's DDR4 memory that brings with double the bandwidth and density versus current generation DDR4. along with delivering improved channel efficiency, is expected to be available in the market starting 2019. JEDEC, the standards body responsible for the DDR specifications, says that base DDR5 frequencies should be at around DDR5-4800 - more than double that of base DDR4's 2133, but a stone throw away from today's fastest (and uber, kidney-like-expensive) 4600 MHz memory kits from the likes of G.Skill and Corsair.

DDR5 is expected to support data rates up to 6.4 Gb/s delivering 51.2 GB/s max, up from 3.2 Gb/s and 25.6 GB/s for today's DDR4. The new version will push the 64-bit link down to 1.1V and burst lengths to 16 bits from 1.2V and 8 bits. In addition, DDR5 lets voltage regulators ride on the memory card rather than the motherboard. CPU vendors are also expected to expand the number of DDR channels on their processors from 12 to 16, which could drive main memory sizes to 128 GB from 64 GB today. Whether this will be good for end-users in relation to DDR5 memory prices remains open for debate; however, considering the rampant memory prices this side of 2017, chances are it won't be unless supply increases considerably.

XFX has launched three variants of the RX 550 graphics cards, the tiny GPU that could, which AMD launched so as to bridge the enormous gap between IGP and its previous entry-line RX 460 (now RX 560) series of graphics cards. There are two low-profile versions of the RX 550, packing either 2GB or 4 GB of memory (whose amounts can be justified or not,) both with boost clocks set at 1203 MHz and 7000 MHz GDDR5 memory over a 128-bit bus. There is also a full-profile, dual slot RX 550, dubbed the Core Edition, and another Core Edition, though this one is a full-profile, single-slot solution.

All of these pack the same 1203 MHz boost clocks, so XFX is basically telling you to pick and choose the size of the graphics cards that best fits your use case, with improvements on cooling and sound profile that come with the larger, beefier cooling solutions. Display outputs stand the same among all the different cards, with 1x DVI-I Dual-Link, 1x DisplayPort, and 1x HDMI 2.0.

JEDEC Solid State Technology Association, responsible for creating the standards on which all of your versions of DDR memory are based upon, recently announced that development of the DDR5 memory standard is well underway, and in time for a 2018 release. The standards body said DDR5 memory will provide double the bandwidth and density versus current generation DDR4. along with delivering improved channel efficiency. Though considering the rate at which DDR4 prices have been increasing as of late, we really should fell a little uneasy at what this new memory standard's adoption will entail.

The current highest base clock that JEDEC allows in their DDR4 memory standard before "overclocking" takes over is DDR4-2400 - with timings ranging from 15~18 for the CAS latency, as well as tRCD, and tRP. And if, as JEDEC says, DDR5 is to be "twice as fast", that could imply that we could end up seeing DDR5-4800. Consider that for a moment: DDR4 kits today only go so far as DDR4-4266, and those are so few and far between that they'll cost you a singular kidney.