BEDO, Intel 430VX and SDRAM in PC Magazine... (Better Titling, please)
This is really not to the above person, but the reply feature just doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense. I was writing to inform the group that the current issue of PC Magazine reviews a Pentium PC that uses Burst EDO memory. That is significant news, I think, as this is the only and first PC to have this type of memory I have seen. Since Micron was a booster of this line of DRAM, this is interesting. The review does not paint a rosy picture because the BEDO DRAM did not help the particular PC (Everex) outperform the rest of the pack by a significant margin. It does not use an Intel chipset, i.e. Triton II obviously.
The article also reviews the Dell Dimension 166s, which is the first to use SDRAM. That PC is above average in CPU scores but was not the top scorer. This PC uses the 430VX chipset by Intel and was the only PC to have this feature, if that's a good word for it. The reviewer was hopeful that future revisions of the system and/or chipset would make better use of the SDRAM. We'll see.
The bottom line? Well, some of us have been worried about SDRAM and the future for Micron, noting that Micron has not moved very aggresively to either 16 MB or SDRAM. Well, since there is only one chipset that supports SDRAM and it doesn't really make a difference, maybe it's not such a concern after all. The Intel 430HX chipset, thanks to superior buffering apparently, which uses ordinary EDO will outperform the current 430VX machines using SDRAM. Maybe a wait and see attitude is appropriate after all. Micron may not be so dumb to wait for better chipsets. Or not.
Also, would anyone happen to know what percentage of production is going to DIMM's? The newer PowerMac's use DIMM's as do some HP machines, for example. Some of the most recent motherboards which support the SDRAM feature of the 430VX chipset which are just hitting the market have SIMM sockets in addition to a *single* DIMM socket. Does anyone know much about the availability of SDRAM DIMM's and how an SDRAM DIMM would work or not work with non-SDRAM SIMM's? This would seem to be an interesting puzzle for the industry.
Thanks,
Matt
P.S. I have a 30 put, too, so I hope this guy gets a break. |
