i new memory chip will come out XDR dram!!!!

[atinvidia]

If there's one company name which stirs up emotion in folks, it's Rambus. Rambus, who in reality is a fairly small IP (intellectual property) firm in Los Altos, California, was once was slated to take over the PC memory market with their radically different Direct RDRAM memory technology. RDRAM was hyped as the next big thing, especially since DDR had not yet hit the market. Plus the most influential company in the PC market, Intel, had signed on to use RDRAM for their chipsets. RDRAM proved to be a crucial element of the Pentium 4's early success, as RDRAM provided a high-bandwidth memory backbone for the Intel's Netburst architecture to run with. Intel's 850-E chipset, paired with PC-1066 RDRAM memory, still proves itself to be a potent memory solution for high-performance systems.
Unfortunately for Rambus, dual channel DDR memory solutions have proved to be quite efficient at delivering the same levels of performance as RDRAM, but at a much lower cost. Soon after dual channel DDR hit the market, Intel declared that DDR would be its memory of choice for high-performance desktops instead of RDRAM, which almost instantly dropped RDRAM off the map. While Rambus and SiS are planning a new RDRAM solution for the Pentium 4, the SiS 659 chipset, it will be an uphill battle to get RDRAM back in the mainstream market without Intel's support.

No matter if you like Rambus the company or not, the general consensus from those who have actually used RDRAM technology is that it is quite a powerful technology. While some have said that the serial-based interface of RDRAM would ultimately be its downfall, Rambus proved that even a 16-bit memory interface can be incredibly effective, assuming one can get the clock speeds high enough. With current RDRAM modules clocking in at over 1 GHz clock speed (1066 MHz), RDRAM solutions actually can provide enough bandwidth to satisfy the needs of Intel's latest Pentium 4 processors.

Despite the low-profile that the company has kept over the past few months, Rambus's engineers have been hard at work. In fact, the next generation Rambus technology which is being announced today has been under development for nearly five years behind the scenes. While many of the technologies have been publicly announced and shown before, today's announcement brings together all of these new technologies under a single nomenclature. Ladies and gentlemen, say hello to the latest memory buzz phrase, XDR.



http://www.gamepc.com/labs/view_cont...ookie%5Ftest=1

[Galen of Edgewood]

Interesting read. Looks like Rambus is trying not to be out of the fight quite yet.

[qmul]

i never used rambus because they secretly patented ram tech that everyone (including themselves) have agreed would be open source and then tried to stab other companies in the back by enforcing those patents and collect royalties. bunch of two-faced idiots. i will never regard rambus as a trustworthy company because of that.

[talldude]

It'll be at least 1.5 years before we see ANY support for this stuff. They haven't even started prototyping yet. I see a niche for it in the gfx business...if they get it out the door fast enough and with a lot of backing.

[Un4given]

I'm not a big Rambus fan, but this type of technology could do very well for the Opteron chips.