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Even a laptop can run RAM externally thanks to CXL

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Re: Even a laptop can run RAM externally thanks to CXL

#11

> 1TB of RAM What are you going to do with the other 999,999,360KB?

If there's a reference I'm missing, enlighten me... Anything to do with data processing, machine learning, llms- hundreds of gigabytes of ram can be incredibly nice. Especially as pandas recommends ram equal to 5-10x the size of the dataset. When you're an individual- not having to think about managing a cluster... Edit: One of the lucky 10000- famous bill gates joke- got it. I walk away cultured

I think Bill Gates once said 640Kb should be enough for anything

Re: Even a laptop can run RAM externally thanks to CXL

#12
The slowest clock speed for DDR5 is 2,000Mhz or 0.5ns per cycle. At 2/3c, electricity should be able to travel about 10cm max in one cycle. I suppose 4Ghz RAM would be only 5cm. Is having an external unit with much greater than 10cm of copper travel ultimately a limiting factor here with modern day RAM speeds?

Re: Even a laptop can run RAM externally thanks to CXL

#13

> 1TB of RAM What are you going to do with the other 999,999,360KB?

If there's a reference I'm missing, enlighten me... Anything to do with data processing, machine learning, llms- hundreds of gigabytes of ram can be incredibly nice. Especially as pandas recommends ram equal to 5-10x the size of the dataset. When you're an individual- not having to think about managing a cluster... Edit: One of the lucky 10000- famous bill gates joke- got it. I walk away cultured

It's a joke based on the fake quote "640k (ram) should be enough for anyone"

Re: Even a laptop can run RAM externally thanks to CXL

#15
post #12

The slowest clock speed for DDR5 is 2,000Mhz or 0.5ns per cycle. At 2/3c, electricity should be able to travel about 10cm max in one cycle. I suppose 4Ghz RAM would be only 5cm. Is having an external unit with much greater than 10cm of copper travel ultimately a limiting factor here with modern day RAM speeds?

You're conflating latency vs. bandwidth.

It is entirely possible to have many bits in transit on a single channel, wired or wireless.

Re: Even a laptop can run RAM externally thanks to CXL

#19
post #12

The slowest clock speed for DDR5 is 2,000Mhz or 0.5ns per cycle. At 2/3c, electricity should be able to travel about 10cm max in one cycle. I suppose 4Ghz RAM would be only 5cm. Is having an external unit with much greater than 10cm of copper travel ultimately a limiting factor here with modern day RAM speeds?

Note that modern RAM protocols assume that multiple bits are in the transmission line that is the wires connecting your CPU to RAM.

Electrical Engineers since at least DDR2, probably earlier, need to ensure that all lines are delay matched to about 100picoseconds.

That is, in DDR2, if DataBit#1 takes 1.1nanoseconds from start-of-wire to end-of-wire, then all other bits must be somewhere between 1.0ns to 1.2ns in length.

This requires impedance controlled pcbs from the manufacturer, and length tracking software for PCB design. (Note: advanced PCB CAD software will even recalculate the speed of light across different lengths, as "inner" tracks have more dielectric surrounding them, slowing down electricity's speed, while "outer" tracks are a bit faster)

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The dielectric of FR4 (the glass/resin used to make PCBs) is what determines the speed of light of the copper actually. And it can be 3.6 or 4.2 or whatever, but the PCB manufacturer will tell you in the PCB specsheets.

Copper guides the wave, but the actual wave travels in the dielectric / insulation between the wires (FR4 in modern PCBs, but if you had open-air wire the dielectric would be the open-air surrounding the wires that form the ground-loop return path). There's been a huge amount of improvements to the understanding of electricity in the past 3 decades, and the old circuit models (sometimes still taught today) are kind of obsolete btw.

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I think I heard that DDR4 is now 10picosecomds (10x more accuracy in delay matching), which is doable with modern CAD and PCB software. I dunno the delay requirements of DDR5.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmission_line

Anyway, look through this Wikipedia on Transmission Line theory, which is a closer model to how electricity "actually" works (but still isn't perfect). But its the level you need to think of electricity to understand modern CPU-to-RAM connections.

In particular, DDR2 / DDR3 / DDR4 / DDR5 connections are almost certainly either Microstrip or Stripline connections, with a fair amount of PCB / Electrical Engineering going into the design to make sure everything works as expected.

Re: Even a laptop can run RAM externally thanks to CXL

#20
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The universe isn't Hacker News :P

But if you ask the people that would actually consider external RAM, I think you'd see a lot of awareness.

How could one consider if they don't know it was possible?

Even more so on a laptop.

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