Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Rambus (RMBS) - Eagle or Penguin -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ian@SI who wrote (30613)	9/24/1999 10:53:00 PM
From: Don Green	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93625

> "If that's true, then you've got really question... the fundamental implementation," said Scott Randall, analyst with Soundview Technology Group in Stamford, Mass. "Intel's better be calling somebody on the carpet, whether it's Rambus, the Camino designers, or the motherboard designers." That is why I will be watching Intel very closely on Monday.. The entire Tech sector might need to pay a price for this possible blunder. Thanks Don

To: Ian@SI who wrote (30613)	9/25/1999 4:47:00 AM
From: Bilow	Respond to of 93625

Hi Ian Stromberg; More on the thermal problems of RDRAM, using your link. It took me about six long, complicated posts on this thread over the last couple weeks to finally show that Rambus is a power hog. I really couldn't believe the tenacity that people have in believing the Rambus BS. But now that the marketting stone has finally been turned over, and turned over with amazing finality, all the bugs are crawling out from under the rocks where the Rambus people have been hiding them. This from that Semiconductor Business News article: Industry sources said that they had discovered that the close proximity of Direct Rambus inline memory modules (RIMMs) created a thermal environment of up to 50 degrees centigrade in certain concentrated areas. However, the existing signal integrity problems apparently were aggravated by the additional heat, analysts said. semibiznews.com For those of you who do not have a calculator available, I compute that 50 degrees C works out to be 122 degrees F. This really isn't that high of a temperature, but it is hot enough to cause some problems. The really important figures are the chip core temperature. To find that out, I need to know the thermal resistance of both the packages and the heat sink. (Note that I don't call it a heat spreader, which is a silly euphemism. Cooling mechanisms have to be designed so that they work under worst case, which would be a single RDRAM chip getting all the hits. This would overheat that chip, hence it needs a heat sink.) Also note that the signal integrity problems were aggravated by the additional heat. I am beginning to sound like the mathematician in the book Jurassic Park, who is constantly warning of the dangers of Chaos. The way that engineers avoid chaos is to ensure enough margin, and this just hasn't been done with this technology. P.S. Do you suppose that now that RMBS is in obvious trouble, that all the press is going to leave them alone for a while? We know that the press wouldn't want to hurt a company by talking too much about their problems, would they, even if it was the technical story of the year? -- Carl