Things You Should Know About RDRAM

Rambus Dynamic Random Access Memory (RDRAM) was first introduced in the year 1996 and went on to become one of the popular models of RAM in the late 90s and in the early part 2000s. Its high memory to cost ratio made Nintendo to incorporate it in their Nintendo 64 console, and Sony to use them in their Play station 2 consoles.

The main advantages of RDRAM are the superior quality, perfect manufacturing and optimal cost. But RDRAM tends to get heated up easily. Those using Play station 2 frequently experienced the heating up of the chips leading to failure of the motherboard. This was later rectified by Sony with the incorporation of proper ventilation and increased fan power. Nintendo 64 did not face this defect as it did feature a CD-ROM, and so there was no drive to increase the heat and block the air flow inside the console.

Latency issues were another major drawback caused by the structure of the RDRAM. To tackle this difficulty, the motherboards which can take in more RDRAM but are not filled to their maximum capacity, were provided with a spacer for easy flow of data. But most systems which are pre-assembled and using RDRAM come with all their slots filled. This is why it is not employed in areas other than budget computers.

Gateway and Dell computers mostly used RDRAM in their simplified models. The drawbacks of RDRAM were considered to be insignificant to users, who did not require any up gradation of their hardware and want an affordable priced system. This forced the inclusion of huge, energy-consumptive fans to be built in but as these systems were considered to be easily disposable these changes were ignored. This naturally resulted in some of the models using RDRAM getting damaged due to excessive heat caused by improper aeration provided by inexperienced users.

Due to various reasons RDRAM was not favored by many and it was found out in 2004 that SDRAM, the major competitor of RDRAM had conspired to reduce the price and put RDRAM out of work. RDRAM was as a result completely out of circuit though the US Justice Department passed a verdict issuing a huge settlement to Rambus Company. Only a small amount of about 5% motherboards supported the RDRAM feature and the majority of them were of low budget type.

Even now RDRAM is still manufactured but only a few systems are capable of supporting it. But in contrast to SDRAM, producing RDRAM is a highly profitable venture. But nowadays producing RDRAM has become very expensive when compared to SDRAM but still it has its own supporters who consider it as one of the superior RAM in the market. Though some stores still feature RDRAM, due to decrease in demand, it is sold mainly in online stores.