14 DAY TRIAL // We would love to say that Transcend has introduced a super-high capacity memory module for PCs, but that is now what the company's latest press release is about, although the subject matter is DDR3.
In its new announcement, Transcend speaks about the a new 32GB DDR3 Load-Reduced DIMM (LRDIMM).
LRDIMMs are made for servers and pack more memory than is normal for most other types of modules.
The new one from Transcend goes a mile beyond the norm though. Thanks to a full memory buffer chip on the module, the electrical load is reduced on all interfaces.
This is because the chip acts as a go-between for all signals sent from the host to the DRAM chips, causing a system using Transcend LRDIMMs to support more modules per channel and higher maximum memory capacity without impact on speed.
The announcement used a dual-Xeon E5 2600 server as an example: when Intel's S2600CO family of motherboards have all 24 slots populated with 32GB LRDIMMs, the top capacity becomes 768 GB, 50% more than with RDIMMs (512 GB) and 500% more than with UDIMMs (128 GB).
For those who want the bare facts, Transcend's 32GB DDR3 Load-Reduced DIMM has a clock speed of 1,333 MHz and the part number TS4GKB72W3P. The company also tossed in a thermal sensor.
Finally, a metallic gray-white heatspreader makes sure the newcomer doesn't produce more heat than can be dissipated by whatever air cooling system a server or data center happens to employ.
Unfortunately, though Transcend's press release was fairly informative, it did not include the all-important pricing details.
Then again, enterprises will have to call the company and negotiate contracts based on shipment size and prior dealings, so the base price, if there is one already decided, matters less than it would for consumer memory modules and/or kits.