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Ask HN: Impact of On-Die Memory on Traditional Memory Industry?
The computer memory industry is famously brutal, resulting in the current oligopoly between Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix. With the news that Apple's M1 chip uses on-die memory that is part of the chip itself, and seeing how amazing the performance of this can be, it stands to reason that other ARM based chips (such as the Ampere Altra and other server-focused chips) might eventually follow. Does this make the traditional memory companies secular losers over the long term (at least in memory-- they also make NAND and other chips)? If so, how long will this transition take?
- wmf 6y agoIt's not on die and the performance isn't that amazing. Everything you've read is wrong.
- eigenvalue 6y agoCan you please elaborate? It's still part of a single SoC package though, right? Can a traditional memory module be used for that sort of application?
- ThrowawayR2 6y agoAs the Wikipedia article on the M1 points out, "The SoC and RAM chips are mounted together in a system-in-a-package design." TSMC doesn't make DRAM chips IIRC (fab process is different), so the RAM on the M1 has to be from one of the DRAM companies.