Unquestionably, the need for a green technology ecosystem is real, and 40nm 1.35V DDR3, the most advanced server memory technology today, is leading the way. In this contributed article, Sylvie Kadivar will examine the key benefits and metrics of Samsungs Green DDR3 technology and highlight the "green" efficiencies achieved when optimally combining process geometry, low voltage, high density and packaging.

DDR3 DRAM is picking up steam in consumer and corporate sales, on the threshold of becoming the most widely available main memory accounting for over 50 percent of the DRAM on the market, beginning in Q1' 2010.

Industry DDR3 Crossover Projection for Q1 '10 (Source: Samsung Elec. 12 '09)

The rapidly growing market for this high-performance memory is driven by the continuous growth of dual- and multi-core CPUs, multi-tasking operations, 64-bit operating systems such as Windows 7 and compute-intensive applications such as virtualization, 3D, gaming and photo/video editing. DDR3 operates at speeds up to 1600Mbps, thus providing double the bandwidth of its predecessor, and perhaps most importantly is available at voltages of 1.5 and green 1.35V " critical for sensitivity to excess power consumption, particularly important in data centers.

Beyond voltage, optimizing process geometry provides absolute power savings at the component and system levels. DDR3 is the first DRAM being produced using 40 nanometer process technology.

When production geometry and voltage are both considered, the combined savings in power consumption of 1.35V 40nm class 2Gb DDR3 can be as high as 73 percent over 1.8V, 60nm class 1Gb DDR2.

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