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>I'm surprised there's no SRAM product for enthusiasts/cost-no-object performance seekers. I suspect it's because the trade-off for the increased performance w
by Accujack 6y ago
>I'm surprised there's no SRAM product for enthusiasts/cost-no-object performance seekers.
I suspect it's because the trade-off for the increased performance would be more than just the price, and that's not even considering the CPU changes and motherboard design necessary to implement SRAM main memory - no CPU maker is going to go to the expense of a separate production line just for enthusiast CPUs that support SRAM core memory.
SRAM density is significantly lower (cells/mm^2) then DRAM, because a DRAM cell can by implemented as a single capacitor, where a SRAM cell is six MOSFETs. So very generally speaking the amount of SRAM you can pack into a chip is about 1/6 (or fewer) the amount of DRAM cells in the same space.
Given that modern CPUs typically have only four DIMM slots populated in pairs and you can't add more without changing the memory interface, that means you've cut the total amount of memory possible in a system by about 80%, so max 6.4GB instead of 32GB.
So.. a memory type for "enthusiasts" that costs e.g. 5x as much as DIMMS, only allows you 20% of the memory size, and also needs a motherboard and CPU design that's incompatible with DIMM based motherboards. Not attractive to too many people.
If you want an easier way to make an enthusiast product with the performance benefits of SRAM, just put the memory on die on a multi-chip module so it's a very short distance from the processor cores (like Apple's M1). Short distance equals good signal integrity, low latency, and on die means simpler motherboard design. The trade off is that you can't add memory later, you have to buy a whole new chip.