Leaked Asus Z390 Motherboard Pics Show DC DIMM Support

VideoCardz revealed in a leak yesterday images of a few motherboards from Asus' upcoming Z390 lineup. The major discovery was that the Maximus XI Extreme and Gene models from the brand's Republic of Gamers (ROG) family will come with support for DC (double capacity) DIMMs.

(Image credit: VideoCardz)

The DC DIMM standard is Asus' own creation for allowing motherboards with limited amounts of memory slots to maximize their memory capacity. It's too early to tell if the DC DIMM format will catch on. Now that Samsung has already started selling its 32GB DDR4 memory modules, DC DIMMs would, at the very least, need to match that capacity in order to compete. Samsung's offering is clocked at 2,666MHz with 1.2V and a CAS latency of 19. It would be interesting to see whether DC DIMM can go higher due to the increased amount of memory chips onboard.

So far, veteran memory manufacturer G.Skill and newcomer Zadak 511 are the first companies to jump aboard Asus' bandwagon. G.Skill has lent its highly acclaimed Trident Z RGB branding to the cause, while Zadak 511 has dressed its first DC DIMM in the brand's shiny Shield armor. If you look closely, you'll notice that the DC DIMM is basically a taller version of your typical DDR4 memory modules, which makes sense since DC DIMM houses more DRAM memory chips. While we're on the topic of memory chips, the Zadak 511 DC DIMM shown in the leaked image employs memory chips from none other than, you guessed it, Samsung. The South Korean manufacturer already laid out plans to tone down its memory chip production next year. If DC DIMM was to be available--and that's a big if--it would probably be very limited in supply and cost a small fortune to secure a piece.

At the time of writing, it's unknown whether DC DIMM support is exclusive to Asus Z390 motherboards or if the other major motherboard manufacturers will join in on the fun. In the meantime, we have reached out to G.Skill and Zadak 511 for further information on their DC DIMMs and will update this article accordingly if they get back to us. 

Zhiye Liu
News Editor and Memory Reviewer

Zhiye Liu is a news editor and memory reviewer at Tom’s Hardware. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.

  • lun471k
    Samsung's huge choke on production will hurt us again, sigh. I'm not too fond at the idea of a new memory type, but it's still sad that this new market could be hindered by a monopoly.
    Reply
  • Brian_R170
    It's non JEDEC. It's going to be expensive on top of the already-high RAM prices that Samsung is intending to keep high. I can maybe see having the DC DIMMs for professional workstation boards because those buyers may have a justifiable business need, but not for a mainstream Z390 board.
    Reply
  • Zaporro
    People can't afford even 16GB of ram because of Samsung and others price fixing the DRAM and now openly stating that they will slow down production to "adjust to demand" (aka. keep current fixed prices) and now mobo manufacturers are adding useless slot for some overpriced high capacity ram sticks nobody seen before.
    Reply
  • popatim
    These non-open standard formats rarely catch on industry wide.
    I don't see this one going anywhere in the normal consumer market since there is no need for them.

    Add in that Optane DDR4 dimms will be available soon in up to 512GB sticks, are faster and have twice the error correction of ECC, this isn't going far in workstation market either.
    Reply
  • c4v3man
    The tall DIMM's remind me of a double decker bus. Might as well call this RAMBUS 2.

    "It's too early to tell if the DC DIMM format will catch on."

    No, it's extremely safe to say it won't catch on. Workstation users who would want this feature will likely get an 8 DIMM motherboard anyways... Consumer 4x16GB/64GB of RAM is a $600+ proposition, workstation/server grade 32GB DIMM's are $500 EACH, and consumer processors like the 8700K only support 64GB anyways. If you're willing to blow $2,000 on RAM alone, you're not likely going to use a Core series CPU and consumer motherboard either.

    The reason people don't have more than 64GB of RAM isn't due to DIMM sizes, it's due to cost and need. I rarely have a use for even 32GB of ram for various editing tasks, and while I accept there are people who have a legitimate NEED for more than 32GB of RAM, most of those users will likely be on a Xeon or X-Series Core CPU with 8+ DIMMS capacity anyways.

    This is targeting a fringe group of users who have enough money for a LGA2066 build, but don't want a LGA2066 because... well I can't think of a reason. And I'd imagine the market can't either. I have no idea why they came up with this unless it has a direct server/workstation spinoff with proper ECC support.
    Reply
  • Lucky_SLS
    Finally, some love for m atx.

    Maximus XI gene and corsair 280X ftw!
    Reply
  • stdragon
    That form-factor will not be CPU HSF friendly for many of the aftermarket solutions that are available. Definitely something to think about before purchasing them.
    Reply
  • antonysg77
    Most people have 4 memory slots, out of which 2 or 3 remain, because they prefer to wait, as memory prices are very high right now. This product is dead on arrival.
    Reply