In computing RAM or Random Access Memory is very important. RAM technology is evolving in years. At the end of 90’s we were using 128 MB RAM. Yes 128 MB it is not joke. Today we are talking about 64, 128 GB RAMs for Laptops and Desktops. In this tutorial we will look details about DDR4 RAM and memory technology.

Release

First DDR4 is released in to market 2014.

Capacity

What makes DDR4 superior than previous ram technologies like DDR3 is its density. More density generally means more memory capacity. Previous ram technologies generally restrict the ram size with 32 GB but the DDR4 memories may have up to 128 GB in single DIMM or RAM. There will no operating system related or driver related change of course.

Power Requirement

Another good feature is lower power requirement with higher data transfer rates. DDR4 requires 1.05V power which is 0.30V lower than its predecessor DDR3.

Prices

DDR4 is new comer and have higher price rates according to DDR3. But this will change in time and we will see more lower prices for DDR4. Here are some price information about the DDR4 RAMs.

128GB (4×32) costs 1282$

64GB (4×16) costs 459$

16GB (1×16) costs 114$

16GB (2×8) costs 109$

Frequency

DDR4 will have following frequency versions.

1600

1866

2133

2400

DDR3 vs DDR4

As we stated in this tutorial the differences are like below.

Capacity

Price

Power Usage

Comp-ability

The format factor of the DDR3 and DDR4 RAMs are same and the pin count is similar. DDR4 have 288 pin but DDR3 have 240pin.

Compatibility

DDR4 have different design factors. The mode density makes the DDR4 RAMs incompatible with previous rams like DDR2 and DDR3. So we can not use our current main board with new DDR4 rams. We have to buy new main board which supports DDR4. So new main board will not support previous DDR2 and DDR3 types RAMs too.