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Politics : RAMTRONIAN's Cache Inn

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To: PZTee who wrote (5278)	4/24/1998 11:41:00 AM
From: Jonas	Read Replies (1) of 14464

Hi Tom, All Re density curve... Here's what I think I know... Well ESDRAM is currently produced using a 0.35 process which is adequate for 16MB densities...At 64MB production equipment doesn't have to be changed but does require modifications in the production process.... At 256MB processes of 0.25 and lower are required...which means state-of-the-art equipment...another important issue which affects costs is wafer-size..and although this is still far out...Siemens I believe will be the first to transfer to 300mm...(Siemens I believe is also among the lowest-cost producers...although even they currently aren't making much if any $ on DRAM) So the fact that rmtr doesn't have its own production capacity is a big plus...they can leverage the manufacturing know-how at Siemens...while they concentrate on product development & sales...I'm saying this because some have viewed this as a -ve...similar case for FRAM... Here's what I know I don't know... What changes to production are required for 128MB (perhaps some new equipment? but not as much as for 256MB?) whether there are ESDRAM-design changes required... So if 128 MB is largely a question of equipment than the Siemens-deal should help accelerate introduction...I believe the 64MB ESDRAM was originally scheduled to be introduced around the time NEC plans to introduce the 128MB density... There are obviously applications that do very nicely with the densities that rmtr curently has to offer...they've had design wins and now have the working capital to serve the demand...so from that perspective I don't see a problem...when the DEC win was made it was also clear that ESDRAM would lag conventional DRAM density... In the Computer segment there are a variety of trade-offs that can be made...the most obvious is price-performance....so a 128MB DRAM module will obviously be cheaper to produce than two 64 MB DRAM modules... but there's still a performance discrepancy and there are probably apps which absolutely need the performance...which ones are these? My 'wishful thinking' is that as long as they are behind only one density generation (for a limited time until they catch up)it's O.K. also wonder if there's a relation between DRAM performance and DRAM requirements... Thought on Samsung/Alpha: ESDRAM doesn't have to be used...but in that case system performance and hence alpha differentiation in the marketplace would be lowered... so it wouldn't make sense to use other DRAM types - IMO that is

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