Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. has started mass production of the industry’s first 8 gigabit (Gb) GDDR5 DRAM, based on the company’s 20nm process technology. Designed for use in graphics cards for PCs and supercomputing applications, and on-board graphics memory for game consoles and notebook PCs, discrete graphics DRAM provides an extensive amount of bandwidth to process large high quality graphically-oriented data streams.
With the rising popularity of 3-D games and UHD video content soon to be widespread, states the memory manufacturer, the need for high-performance, high-bandwidth graphics memory has begun to rapidly increase.
Samsung’s new GDDR5 DRAM boasts outstanding bandwidth, combining eight of the new 8Gb chips to achieve the same density as the 8 gigabytes (GB) needed in the latest game consoles.
The memory operates with an I/O data rate of 8 gigabits per second (Gbps) per pin and each chip can process data at 32-bit I/O rate. Two GB of graphics memory can be created with two of the new chips, which together can process up to 64GB of graphical images per second. According to Samsung, that equates to processing approximately 12 full-HD DVDs (5GB equivalent) in a second.
With this new 8Gb GDDR5, Samsung has completed its line-up of 8Gb DRAM solutions based on its 20nm process technology, covering the server, PC, mobile, and graphics memory markets. The company plans to expand the production volumes of its 20nm DRAM products at other densities including 4Gb, 6Gb, 8Gb, and higher.
“We expect that our 8Gb GDDR5 will provide original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) with the best graphics memory solution available for game consoles as well as general use notebook PCs,” says Joo Sun Choi, executive vice president of Memory Sales and Marketing at Samsung Electronics.
