Thursday, July 31, 2008

What Types of Memory Stick Media are Available?

Memory Stick media was first launched by Sony in 1998, and has received several revisions since then. The original format is no longer in use, but its name is still used in general to describe similar types of products. They are used in Sony and Sony Ericsson products for the most part.

The original Memory Stick media ranged in size from 4MB to 128MB in size, however could not expand to include more then 128MB of storage due to architectural limitations. In response to this, Sony developed the Memory Stick Select (http://www.oempcworld.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=MSG ) first, which is similar to having two sticks sharing the same case. To switch from one to the other, a physical switch is flipped, and it switches from one partition to the other. While potentially offering more space, the Memory Stick Select was unpopular due to the inconvenience of having separate pieces of memory that could not work together in the same device.

Sony's next offering is the Memory Stick Pro (http://www.oempcworld.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=MSP), which solved the space limitation and allows for up to 4GB of data, a great increase over the original. Even better, it was backwards compatible with the majority of the older devices. While the 4GB modules (http://www.oempcworld.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=MSP4096&Category_Code=MSP) are somewhat expensive at $90, 2GB (http://www.oempcworld.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=MSP2048&Category_Code=MSP) and lower modules are easily affordable, all for under $60, and many for less then $30.

Currently Sony has three other versions of the Memory Stick on the market - the Memory Stick Duo and Pro Duo (http://www.oempcworld.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=MSP), and the Memory Stick Micro (http://www.oempcworld.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=M2). The Duo is smaller then the original, about two thirds of the size. However, it comes with an adapter to let it plug into normal stick readers. The Duo comes in the same capacity as the original Memory Stick, while the Pro Duo has expanded storage capability, like the Pro. The two versions were created for use in smaller, pocket-sized cameras and cell phones.

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

SDRAM vs. RDRAM, Facts and Fantasy

SDRAM vs. RDRAM, Facts and Fantasy:

Intel's decision to chain the Pentium processor to RDRAM system memory has raised quite a controversy. This article will get into greater detail about Rambus, SDRAM, RDRAM and the relationship between Intel and Rambus and why both these companies keep backing their technologies.

We'll address most of the issues that generally seem to be considered 'disadvantages' of Rambus technology and investigate whether these are based on fact or fantasy. At times we'll go deeper into technical detail than some of you might be willing to follow, in order to prove a point or accurately describe a specific function. But overall we’ve tried to keep the technical details and analysis to a minimum and as basic and straightforward as possible. However, we’ve made sure that our benchmarking setup, the suite of benchmarks used, and our technical analysis is reproducible by anyone wishing to do so. We at HardwareCentral always aim to keep our benchmarks and reviews as objective as possible, and this SDRAM vs. RDRAM article is no exception.

In the following pages you'll find an in-depth analysis of Rambus' RDRAM, what makes it tick, what the benefits are and above all we'll look into its technological advantages, as those will most likely determine whether RDRAM is worthwhile or not. The analysis will be followed by a discussion of benchmarks and why we’ve chosen to use this specific set, as well as an analysis on how each particular benchmark makes use of system resources.

We'll round off this article with a broad range of real world benchmarks, aimed at exploring the technological advantages and disadvantages as pointed out in the theoretical analysis of the previous pages, checking theory with practice. And, naturally, the conclusion will summarize the results as well as give our verdict on SDRAM vs. RDRAM.