Intel Optane DIMMs fit in DDR4 slot and offer up to 512GB of persistent memory

When Intel and Micron first talked about 3D XPoint memory in 2015, it seemed like a marvelous thing. Since that date, we haven't really seen a lot of exciting use cases, but that may change as Intel is getting closer to roll out its Optane DIMMs.

The whole idea here is to eventually shake up the architecture of computers by getting rid of RAM and HDD/SSD storage. The promise of Optane is to offer speeds similar to RAM, while delivering capacities and persistence similar to NAND flash memory.

The first step is the Optane DC Persistent Memory, this product will be supported by the next generation of Intel's Xeon server platform. The Optane DC Persistent Memory fits in a DDR4 memory slot and will be offered in 128GB, 256GB, and 512GB capacities.

The DIMMs are currently sampling to clients and should hit the market in 2019. Unfortunately, the announcement was pretty light on details. We don't know anything about the performance, endurance, power consumption, nor pricing.

Intel is not officially disclosing whether it will be possible to mix and match DRAM and Optane Persistent Memory on the same memory controller channel, but the 192GB DRAM capacity for the development preview systems indicates that they are equipped with a 16GB DRAM DIMM on every memory channel. Also not disclosed in today's briefing: power consumption, clock speeds, specific endurance ratings, and whether Optane DC Persistent Memory will be supported across the Xeon product line or only on certain SKUs. Intel did vaguely promise that Optane DIMMs will be operational for the normal lifetime of a DIMM, but we don't know what assumptions Intel is making about workload.

Via: AnandTech