Ram Guide

SLDRAM

Many memory manufacturers are putting their support behind SLDRAM as the long-term solution for system performance. While SLDRAM is a protocol-based design, just as RDRAM is, it is an open-industry-standard, which requires no royalty payments. This alone should allow for lower cost. Another cost advantage for the SLDRAM design is that it does not require a redesign of the RAM chips.

Due to the use of packets for address, data and control signals, SLDRAM can operate on a faster bus than standard SDRAM - up to at least 200 MHz. Just as DDR SDRAM operates the output signal at twice the clock rate, so can SLDRAM. This puts the output operation as high as 400 MHz, with some engineers claiming it can reach 800 MHz in the near future.

Compared to DRDRAM, it seems that SLDRAM is a much better solution due to the lower actual clock speed (reducing signal problems), lower latency timings and lower cost due to the royalty-free design and operation on current bus designs. It appears that even the bandwidth of SLDRAM is much higher than DRDRAM at 3.2 GB/s vs. 1.6 GB/s

Though Intel initially intended to support only DRDRAM in future chipsets, competing chipset manufacturers, memory manufacturers and pressure from end users may force them to include support for SLDRAM as well. If the marketplace can successfully influence Intel to provide this support, we may actually see a situation where the best technology wins over marketing hype.