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AMD today announced the first commercial implementation of Graphics
Double Data Rate, version 5 (GDDR5) memory in its forthcoming next
generation of ATI Radeon graphics card products. The
high-speed, high-bandwidth GDDR5 technology is expected to become
the new memory standard in the industry, and that same performance
and bandwidth is a key enabler of The Ultimate Visual Experience,
unlocking new GPU capabilities. AMD is working with a number
of leading memory providers, including Samsung, Hynix and Qimonda,
to bring GDDR5 to market.
Today's GPU performance is
limited by the rate at which data can be moved on and off the
graphics chip, which in turn is limited by the memory interface
width and die size. The higher data rates supported by GDDR5
– up to 5x that of GDDR3 and 4x that of GDDR4 – enable more
bandwidth over a narrower memory interface, which can translate into
superior performance delivered from smaller, more cost-effective
chips.1 AMD's senior engineers worked closely with industry
standards body JEDEC in developing the new memory technology and
defining the GDDR5 spec.
"The days of monolithic
mega-chips are gone. Being first to market with GDDR in our
next-generation architecture, AMD is able to deliver incredible
performance using more cost-effective GPUs," said Rick Bergman,
senior vice president and general manager, Graphics Product Group,
AMD. "AMD believes that GDDR5 is the optimal way to drive
performance gains while being mindful of power consumption.
We're excited about the potential GDDR5 brings to the table for
innovative game development and even more exciting game play."
The introduction of GDDR5-based
GPU offerings marks the continued tradition of technology leadership
in graphics for AMD. Most recently AMD has been first to bring
a unified shader architecture to market, the first to support
Microsoft DirectX 10.1 gaming, first to lower process nodes like
55nm, the first with integrated HDMI with audio, and the first with
double-precision floating point calculation support.
AMD expects that PC graphics will
benefit from the increase in memory bandwidth for a variety of
intensive applications. PC gamers will have the potential to play at
high resolutions and image quality settings, with superb overall
gaming performance. PC applications will have the potential to
benefit from fast load times, with superior responsiveness and
multi-tasking.
"Qimonda has worked closely
with AMD to ensure that GDDR5 is available in volume to best support
AMD's next-generation graphics products," said Thomas Seifert,
chief operating officer of Qimonda AG. "Qimonda's ability
to quickly ramp production is a further milestone in our successful
GDDR5 roadmap and underlines our predominant position as innovator
and leader in the graphics DRAM market."
GDDR5 for stream processing
In addition to the potential for
improved gaming and PC application performance, GDDR5 also holds a
number of benefits for stream processing, where GPUs are applied to
address complex, massively parallel calculations. Such
calculations are prevalent in high-performance computing, financial
and academic segments among others. AMD expects that the
increased bandwidth of GDDR5 will greatly benefit certain classes of
stream computations.
New error detection mechanisms in
GDDR5 can also help increase the accuracy of calculations by
indentifying errors and re-issuing commands to get valid data.
This capability is a level of reliability not available with other
GDDR-based memory solutions today.
-- Tech Times Online
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