Corsair has joined the ranks of RAM manufacturers who are gearing up for the upcoming release of the Intel Alder Lake processors. The company announced that preparations are well underway and we can expect to see the new DDR5 RAM modules hit the shelves later this year. Corsair also revealed the expected bandwidth and capacity of the new DDR5 memory sticks, promising performance unlike anything we’ve seen in the era of DDR4.
DDR4 RAM had a good run, but with the next generation of CPUs on the horizon, it’s on the way out the door. Corsair claims that we will see massive improvements in memory speed and capacity. Compared to one of Corsair’s 3200MHz DDR4 RAM modules, the newly announced 6400MHz DDR5 stick is an enormous step up.
In the aforementioned example of a 3200MHz DDR4 model versus the 6400MHz DDR5, the manufacturer expects an increase in memory bandwidth from 26GB/s to a much higher frequency of 51GB/s. DDR5 RAM is also said to run at a base clock speed of 4800MHz, but the technology is expected to support up to 8400MHz.
Corsair also announced that the capacity of a single stick of RAM is going to be quadrupled. DDR4 RAM has a maximum capacity of 32GB per DIMM (dual in-line memory module), but the new DDR5 can support up to 128GB. This increase is not yet a necessity for our current standards, but it paves the way for future upgrades and will prevent bottlenecks in high-end PCs.
According to Corsair, the improved bandwidth in DDR5 is going to make better use of the memory bus while the massive capacities will allow your PC to handle even more tasks at once. This makes DDR5 especially appealing to streamers and content creators.
With the new Intel Alder Lake CPUs due to release in the fall, Corsair is working to meet the deadline and prepare its new DDR5 RAM in time for the 12th generation of Intel processors. AMD users are likely going to have to wait longer to try out the new DDR5 technology, as the next generation of AMD CPUs, Zen 4, is rumored to release much later, in the second half of 2022.
