Core i7 Bloomfield officially supports only DDR3 800 and 1066, no 1333

[AuDioFreaK39]

http://www.fudzilla.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=9475&Itemid=1

DDR3 1333 support and higher, comes later

Intel's chief architect Ronan Singhal has confirmed that Bloomfield, Core i7 CPUs will officially support only DDR3 800 and DDR3 1066MHz memory. At launch there won’t be an official support for DDR3 1333 not to mention any higher memory frequencies.


At the same time, this doesn’t mean that you won’t be able to run your DDR3 memory at higher speeds than DDR3 1066. We learned that DDR3 1600 is also possible but at this stage this is considered as overclocking and it is not officially supported by Intel.

We also learned that shortly after the launch, Intel might validate DDR3 1333 and maybe even some faster memory but we didn’t get many details about it.

The launch SKUs will be officially stuck with DDR3 1066 while the faster one’s will be considered overclocking. Even the DDR3 2000 should be possible but this will mainly depend on the board.

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oh well, I'm still buying the new DDR3 Ballistix Tracers, which HAVE been confirmed (just received another NDA email from Micron's engineering department ) and I will be posting the news tomorrow.

 

[buzzlightbeer]

lol native quad, imc and 1066 memory


sounds familiar

 

[V3NOM]

DDR3 800? didn't even think that existed... why would you get DDR3 800 when you could get DDR2 800 with lower latency and cost..

 

[mi1ez]

Yeah, except performance which is yet to be seen...

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

The mystery chip.........

 

[jimmysmitty]

DDR3 800? didn't even think that existed... why would you get DDR3 800 when you could get DDR2 800 with lower latency and cost..

Yes lets get 4GB of DDR2 800 and put it in a dual channel configurations on a older Core 2 chip and compare its performance with lets say even 3GB of DDR3 800 in a tri channel configuration with a IMC one the CPU. I think the 3GB of DDR3 800 will win because of two things. 1 the IMC boosts membroy bandwidth and 2 the tri channel configuration also boosts memory bandwidth.

Either way I don't see why people are so worried over the memory speed when the IMC will more than make up for a lower memory speed by adding much more memory bandwidth and also accessing the memory much faster.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Memory speeds arent as important. Start thinking AMD vs effect of memory speeds. Same thing. Just like AMD

 

[jimmysmitty]

^Thats my point. People don't seem to realize that no FSB means that memory speeds do not effect much. With AMDs Phenoms, if you move from 800MHz DDR2 to 1066MHz DDR2 you wont see as much of a benefit as you would with Intels Core 2 series. And the move to 1333MHz DDR2 for AMD is even less noticeable.

The only place higher clocked RAM will be effective for now is the server side where it can use the extra bandwidth that it would give.

But DDR3 1066 @ 8.5GB/s per channel in tri channel means you have 25.5GB/s worth of memory bandwidth and from some benchmarks I have seen Nehalem can get about 18.8GB of that memory bandwidth compared to a C2Q with DDR3 1333MHz in dual channel at only about 7-8GB of memory bandwidth.

Now why people cannot see that even with a lower memory speed you will benefit more from having a IMC being able to access the memory faster and the tri channel giving more bandwidth than ever before.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Its great for server, not too much gains in DT. All those arguments the AMD fans brought about BW being superior was pointless using DT, and its the same now. It helps, but not alot. IPC is what Im interested in, that and Ghz

 

[Sable Wanderer]

will the core i7 models work with ddr 2 ?

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

yes, but why bother? In certain setups, but wont really be ideal

 

[spathotan]

Well I would assume DDR3 prices would finally drop to be semi reasonable prices once the chip and the X58 boards launch, but thats wishful thinking.

Also.....dare I be lame and play the harp; with the current situation the economy is in, im not expecting prices to drop anytime soon. But who knows, even to this very day nobody knows how the economy works.

 

[AuDioFreaK39]

will the core i7 models work with ddr 2 ?

simply put: no, not at all.

All Nehalem CPUs (and future CPUs I'm assuming) are meant to be run with DDR3-only.

 

[epsilon84]

^Thats my point. People don't seem to realize that no FSB means that memory speeds do not effect much. With AMDs Phenoms, if you move from 800MHz DDR2 to 1066MHz DDR2 you wont see as much of a benefit as you would with Intels Core 2 series. And the move to 1333MHz DDR2 for AMD is even less noticeable.

Actually I think its the other way around. I'm almost certain Phenom gains more from DDR2-1066 than Core 2, K8 definitely gained more from faster memory than Core 2 also, its not about the bandwith (its already overkill) but rather the lower overall latency with higher speed RAM.