Samsung talks up its fast and power-efficient GDDR7 memory
Samsung has divulged some updates on its next generation memory products—including GDDR7 memory—at its annual Memory Tech Day in San Jose. Alongside GDDR7, Samsung announced its Shinebolt HBM3E memory, which is being developed for upcoming AI and compute GPUs.
GDDR7 memory has been in development for some time. It's set to appear in next generation Blackwell RTX 50-series and RDNA 4 RX 8000-series graphics cards. Samsung didn't disclose too many details, but one of the most interesting little nuggets was the reveal of a target of 50% less stand-by power. That'll help to reduce overall idle power consumption, and hopefully lower it for multi-monitor setups and video playback too.
GDDR7 memory is set to operate at 1.2V compared to the 1.35v operating voltage of GDDR6 and GDDR6X. Assuming we see high speeds of up to 32Gbps as predicted, a total bandwidth of 1TB/s is possible over a 256-bit bus. In the case of a 384-bit bus, that bandwidth would increase by a further 50%.
Samsung previously disclosed that its GDDR7 memory will utilize PAM3 (pulse-amplitude modulation) signaling as opposed to GDDR6X's PAM4. While PAM4 is better suited to higher frequencies, PAM3 is easier to implement, making it a better option for affordable consumer graphics cards. That partly explains why we've never seen affordable GDDR6X cards, even though faster memory would be beneficial when considering the relatively thin memory buses of current generation mid-range GPUs.
PAM3 delivers lower average bit-error rates, but given the higher inherent performance offered by GDDR7, PAM4 is seen as the preferable option for now. Of course, that leaves the door open to a future GDDR7X standard. Is that something Micron might have up its sleeve? We'll have to
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