Compaq AP250 Compaq Deskpro Workstation Key Technologies White Paper - Page 5

WHITE PAPER (cont'd) Compaq Deskpro Workstation - Key Technologies Customer Benefits • Higher core clock frequency (MHz) performance with 133-MHz FSB and 256-KB full speed L2 cache provide the power needed to simultaneously run user applications and background IT services that help reduce network bandwidth requirements and protect corporate data. • Streaming SIMD Extensions provide network bandwidth improvements, from enhanced TCP/IP performance and compression/decompression, as well as an enhanced 3D and multimedia processing hardware platform. Delivers expanded support for rich data types and emerging applications and interfaces, such as speech recognition, video and audio. • Improved overall system performance by enhancing the speed at which data is transferred between the processor and other parts of the system. • Delivers the latest technology with a platform that provides performance headroom and longevity into the year 2000. Rambus Technology Developed by Rambus, Inc. in conjunction with Intel Corporation, Rambus DRAM (RDRAM) is a new memory technology designed to keep pace with the latest high-speed microprocessors and graphics controllers. Workstation users demand the ability to quickly and easily navigate tremendous amounts of information, including complex graphics and multimedia content. The Rambus solution achieves a ten-fold increase in component throughput, while utilizing fewer ICs and assuring a modular/scalable solution. A single RDRAM is capable of delivering 1.6 GB/s per channel. It is 2 bytes wide running at 400 MHz clock with 95% efficient memory sub-system and protocol. Data is transferred twice in each cycle − on both the rising and falling edge of the clock. The 800-MHz description in memory modules is referring to both the rising and falling edge of the clock. 2 Bytes * 400M Transfers/s * 2 = 1.6 GB/s. Customer Benefits • Improves memory bandwidth to increase performance in memory-intensive applications. • Provides headroom to accommodate the fast memory requests of increasingly powerful processors. 5