Intel and Micron announced on Tuesday their new 3D XPoint memory type that can last 1,000 times longer and perform 1,000 times faster than today's NAND memory. The company also announced that their new memory chips could be out on the market as soon as next year.
The new type of memory designed by Intel and Micron will offer and incredible performance and endurance. According to the two silicon chips manufacturers, 3D XPoint memory technology is the biggest innovation in more than 25 years. The new memory type will enable new advances in microelectronics and will allow new modes of computing.
According to a Senior VP at Intel, Rob Cooke, "this is a breakthrough in technology." The company considers 3D XPoint as a new class of memory because it has a lot higher endurance and it is a lot faster.
According to reports from both companies, 3D XPoint is not just a faster NAND, but a truly different and new technology. 3D XPoint memories can function as storage because it is non-volatile, as well as main memory because of its speed. The new memory designed by Intel and Micron could potentially be used in conjunction with traditional DRAM memory or as the sole memory technology in a computer.
The joined 3D NAND announced earlier in May just extended the density of NAND, while 3DX Point is truly a different and revolutionary technology. According to Cooke, in order to better understand the new memory technology, we can think of 3D XPoint as a screen door that features at each point where the wires cross each other some extremely fast switches.
The developers of the new memory technology are still in the very early stages of 3D XPoint's development. However, both companies are confident that the new technology could see the light as early as next year. An actual wafer made up of 3D XPoint was shown by Intel and Micron as proof of how far they have come. 3D XPoint memories developed by the two companies are already real and will offer amazing performance comparing to today's SSDs.
The new type of memory will be produced in Lehigh, Utah, at the joint facility of the two companies. Mark Durcan, CEO of Micron declared regarding the cost of the development that "it didn't come cheaply."
The new 3D XPoint memory will likely require eventually a redesigning of our traditional PCs, since today's SATA would be too slow. Cooke explained that this is one of the reasons why Intel has been pushing the silicon industry so hard to support new technologies such as NVMe.
