Memory developer Rambus, creators of the ill-fated RDRAM for the Intel desktop platform, are touting their upcoming XDR graphics memory as being five times faster than current graphics memory products such as GDDR3. The company claims that its first generation XDR, chosen for use in Sony"s Playstation 3, will operate at speeds upwards of 4.8GHz while its newly announced successor, XDR2, will push speeds of 8GHz.
While the primary funcution of Rambus"s new technology will be gaming, the company believes that it also has other practical uses, such as high speed network routing and switching. XDR2 is already available for licensing and products utilizing it are expected to emerge sometime in the year 2007.