AMD Fiji XT can reportedly support HBM2

Posted on Tuesday, April 07 2015 @ 13:10 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
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A couple of months from now AMD is expected to introduce its Fiji XT flagship graphics card. Current rumors point to a launch in June and this will be world's first graphics card to feature the new High Bandwidth Memory (HBM). FUD Zilla writes today that AMD might also have a way to make Fiji XT compatible with HBM2, which could allow the firm to launch a revised Fiji XT towards the end of the year or early 2016 to make it more competitive versus NVIDIA's Pascal.

The difference between first-gen and second-gen HBM is pretty big, the second-gen doubles the bandwidth and enables higher memory density. The exact tweaks required to support HBM2 are unknown, it could be a simple PCB revision or a more complicated GPU revision.
4-HI HBM1 has a 1024-bit interface, can handle two prefetch operations per IO and has a maximum bandwidth of 128GB per second. The tRC is 48nm, with tCCD of 2ns (1tCK), and the VDD voltage of 1.2V. For example GDDR5 has 1.35 to 1.5V and a top bandwidth of 28GB/s throughput per chip.

The 4-Hi HBM2 solution, according official SK Hynix data provided to Fudzilla, has 1024 bit I/O, two prefects operations per IO, and 64 Byte access granularity (=I/O x prefetch). The maximum possible bandwidth with HBM 2 doubles to 256GB per chip at the same 48nm tRC, with tCCD of 2ns (1tCK), and the VDD voltage of 1.2V.


About the Author

Thomas De Maesschalck

Thomas has been messing with computer since early childhood and firmly believes the Internet is the best thing since sliced bread. Enjoys playing with new tech, is fascinated by science, and passionate about financial markets. When not behind a computer, he can be found with running shoes on or lifting heavy weights in the weight room.



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