Samsung Sampling 512GB CXL Memory Module

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. announced the development of the 512GB Compute Express Link (CXL) DRAM, taking a step toward the commercialization of CXL which will enable high memory capacity with low latency in IT systems.

Since introducing this CXL DRAM prototype with a FPGA controller in May 2021, the company has been working with data center, enterprise server and chipset companies to develop an improved, customizable CXL device.

The CXL DRAM is built with an ASIC CXL controller and packs 512GB of DDR5 DRAM, featuring 4x the memory capacity and one-fifth the system latency over the previous company’s CXL offering.

“CXL DRAM will become a critical turning point for future computing structures by substantially advancing AI and big data services, as we aggressively expand its usage in next-gen memory architectures including software-defined memory (SDM),” said Cheolmin Park, VP, memory global sales and marketing, Samsung Electronics, and director, CXL Consortium. “Samsung will continue to collaborate across the industry to develop and standardize CXL memory solutions, while fostering an increasingly solid ecosystem.“

“As an active member of the CXL Consortium, Lenovo is committed to developing this important standard and helping build the ecosystem around the new CXL interconnect,” said Greg Huff, CTO, Lenovo Infrastructure Solutions Group. “We are excited to be part of Samsung’s CXL development program, working to foster the growth and adoption of innovative CXL products in future Lenovo systems.”

“CXL is a key technology that enables more innovative ways to manage memory expansion and pooling which will play an important role in next-generation server platforms,” said Christopher Cox, VP, strategic technology, Montage Technology. “Montage is excited to continue partnering with Samsung to help the CXL ecosystem expand rapidly.“

In recent years, the growth of the metaverse, AI and big data has been generating explosive amounts of data. However, conventional DDR design limits the scaling of memory capacity beyond the 10TB range, requiring a new memory interface technology like CXL.

The large pool of memory that is shared between CXL and main memory allows a server to expand its memory capacity to tens of terabytes, and at the same time increase its bandwidth to several terabytes per second.

The company’s 512GB CXL DRAM will be the first memory device that supports the PCIe 5.0 interface and will come in an EDSFF (E3.S) form factor – suitable for next-gen high-capacity enterprise servers and data centers.

Later this month, the firm plans to unveil an updated version of its open-source Scalable Memory Development Kit (SMDK). The toolkit is a software package that allows the CXL memory expander to work in heterogeneous memory systems – enabling system developers to incorporate CXL memory into various IT systems running AI, big data and cloud applications, without having to modify existing application environments.

The company will begin sampling its 512GB CXL DRAM with customers and partners for joint evaluation and testing in 3Q22 and plans to have the memory ready for commercialization as next-gen server platforms become available. As a member of the CXL Consortium board of directors, the firm is collaborating with global data center, server and chipset vendors to deliver next-genn interface technologies that can bring highly tangible benefits to the IT industry.