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LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

ifixit.com

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Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#121

Post by jwells89 »

antonkochubey wrote: post #119
jwells89 wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve been wondering for a while now why ASUS or some other gaming laptop manufacturer doesn’t take one of their flagship gaming laptop motherboards, put some beefy but quiet cooling on it, put it in a pizza-box/console enclosure, and sell it as a silent compact gaming desktop. A machine like that could still be relatively small but still be dramatically better cooled than even the thickest laptop due to not having to…

ZOTAC does these - there are ZBOX Magnus with laptop-grade RTX 4000 series GPUs in 2-3 liter chassis. However their performance and acoustics are rather.. compromised, compared to a proper SFF desktop (which can be built in ~3x the volume)

Yeah, those look like they’re too small to be reasonably cooled. What I had in mind is shaped like the main body of a laptop but maybe 2-3x as thick (to be able to fit plenty of heatsink and proper 120/140mm fans), stood up on its side.

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#122

Post by consp »

sliken wrote: post #120
7speter wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple could just make lower tier macbooks but mac fanboys wouldnt be able to ask “but what about apples quarterly profits?” Most macbooks dont need high memory bandwidth, most users are using their macs for word processing, excel and vscode.

Even low end gaming, simulations, and even fun webGL toys can require a fair amount of memory bandwidth with an iGPU, like apple's M series. It also helps quite a bit for inference. I MBP with a M3 max can run models requiring multiple GPUs on a desktop and still get decent perf for single users.

> I MBP with a M3 max can run models requiring multiple GPUs on a desktop and still get decent perf for single users.

Good for your niche case, the other 99.8% still only does web and low performance desktop applications (which includes IDEs)

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#123

Post by cjk2 »

7speter wrote: post #78
colinng wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They will maliciously comply. They might even have 4 sockets for the 512-bit wide systems. But then they’ll keep the SSD devices soldered - just like they’ve done for a long time. Or cover them with epoxy, or rig it with explosives. That’ll show you for trying to upgrade! How dare you ruin the beautiful fat profit margin that our MBAs worked so hard to design in?!?

Apple lines perimeter of the nand chips on modern mac minis with an array of tiny capacitors, so even the crazy people with heater boards can’t unsolder the nand and replace them with higher density NAND.

This is normal. They are called decoupling capacitors and are there to provide energy if the SSD requires short bursts of it. If you put them any further away the bit of wire between them and the gate turns into an inductor and has some somewhat undesirable characteristics.

Also replacing them is not rocket science. I reckon I could do one fine (used to do rework). The software side is the bugbear.

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#124

Post by cjk2 »

colinng wrote: post #36
cjk2 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given enough pressure ...

They will maliciously comply. They might even have 4 sockets for the 512-bit wide systems. But then they’ll keep the SSD devices soldered - just like they’ve done for a long time. Or cover them with epoxy, or rig it with explosives. That’ll show you for trying to upgrade! How dare you ruin the beautiful fat profit margin that our MBAs worked so hard to design in?!?

This is hyperbole. They are replaceable. It's just more difficult.

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#125

Post by pmontra »

7speter wrote: post #77
pja wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This PDF[1] suggests that an LPCAMM2 module has a 128 bit wide memory interface, so the epic memory bandwidth of the M3 max won’t be achievable with one of these memory modules. High end devices could potentially have two or more of them arranged around the CPU though? [1] https://investors.micron.com/node/47186/pdf

Apple could just make lower tier macbooks but mac fanboys wouldnt be able to ask “but what about apples quarterly profits?” Most macbooks dont need high memory bandwidth, most users are using their macs for word processing, excel and vscode.

As a non Mac reference, I work on a HP laptop from 2014. It was a high end laptop by then. It's between 300 and 600 Euro refurbished now.

I expanded it to 32 GB RAM, 3 TB SSD but it's still a i7 4xxx with 1666 MHz RAM. And yet it's OK for Ruby, Python, Node, PostgreSQL, docker. I don't feel the need to upgrade. I will when I'll get a major failure and no spare parts to fix it.

So yes, low end Macs are probably good for nearly everything.

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#126

Post by Vogtinator »

klausa wrote: post #111
tombert wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I was actually surprised to learn there was a reason other than "Apple wants you to buy a new Macbook or overspec your current one". It's annoying, but at least there's a plausible reason to why they do it.

Apple's RAM is not soldered to the _motherboard_, it's part of the SoC package.

Only recently. It started out as soldered to the main board.

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#127

Post by yread »

orev wrote: post #14

I’m glad they explained why RAM has become soldered to the board recently. It’s easy to be cynical and assume they were doing it for profit motive purposes (which might be a nice side effect), but it’s good to know that there’s also a technical reason to solder it. Even better to know that it’s been recognized and a solution is being worked on.

If they soldered a decent amount that gou can be sure you don't ever need to upgrade it would be fine (seriously, 64GB ram costs like 100eur, non issue in a 1000eur laptop). 8 is not enough already and 16 will soon be limiting too.

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#128

Post by quailfarmer »

I'm sure this will find use in Business-Class "Mobile workstations", but having integrated DDR4 in my own hardware, I have a hard time seeing this as the mainstream path forward for mobile computing.

There's lots of value in tight integration. Improved signal integrity (ie, faster), improved reliability, better thermal flow, smaller packaging, and lower cost. Do I really want to compromise all of those things just to make RAM upgrades easier?

And how many times do I need to upgrade the RAM in a laptop, really? Twice? Why make all those sacrifices to use a connector, instead of just reworking the DRAM parts? A robotic reflow machine is not so complex that a small repair shop couldn't afford one, which is what you see if you to to parts of the world where repair is taken seriously. Why do I need to be able to do it at home? I can't re-machine my engine at home. It's the most advanced nanotechnology humanity can produce, why is a $5k repair setup unreasonable?

This is not to mention the direction things are really going, DRAM on Package/Die. The signaling speed and bus widths possible with co-packaged memory and HBM are impossible to avoid, and I'm not going to complain about the fact that I can't upgrade the RAM separately from the CPU, any more than I complain about not being able to upgrade my L2 cache today. The memory is part of the compute, in the same way the GPU memory is part of the GPU.

I hope players like iFixit and Framework aren't too stubborn in opposing the tight integration of modern platforms. "Repairable" doesn't need to mean the same thing it did 10 years ago, and there are so many repairability battles that are actually worth fighting, that being stubborn about the SOTA isn't productive.

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#129

Post by Timshel »

quailfarmer wrote: post #128

I'm sure this will find use in Business-Class "Mobile workstations", but having integrated DDR4 in my own hardware, I have a hard time seeing this as the mainstream path forward for mobile computing. There's lots of value in tight integration. Improved signal integrity (ie, faster), improved reliability, better thermal flow, smaller packaging, and lower cost. Do I really want to compromise all of those things just to…

>I'm sure this will find use in Business-Class "Mobile workstations", but having integrated DDR4 in my own hardware, I have a hard time seeing this as the mainstream path forward for mobile computing.

Don't know would say the reverse, workstation might need the performance of DRAM on Package/Die, but I don't believe it's the case for mainstream user.

> A robotic reflow machine

Same maybe to service enterprise customer but probably way too expensive for mainstream.

I certainly hope that players continue to oppose tight integration and I'll try to support them. I value the ability that anyone can swap ram and disks to easily upgrade or repair their device more than an increase of performance or even battery life.

I recently cobbled up a computer for a friend's child with component from three different computers; any additional cost would have made the exercise worthless.

Re: LPCAMM2 is a modular, repairable, upgradeable memory standard for laptops

#130

Post by audunw »

Aurornis wrote: post #42
mmastrac wrote: post #2

Ugh, finally. And it's not just a repurposed desktop memory standard either! The overall space requirements look to be similar to the BGA that you'd normally solder on (perhaps 2-3x as thick?). I'm sure they can reduce that overhead going forward. I love the disclosure at the bottom: Full Disclosure: iFixit has prior business relationships with both Micron and Lenovo, and we are hopelessly biased in favor of repairab…

> Ugh, finally. FYI, the '2' at the end is because this isn't the first time this has been done. :) LPCAMM spec has been out for a while. LPCAMM2 is the spec for next-generation parts. Don't expect either to become mainstream. It's relatively more expensive and space-consuming to build an LPCAMM motherboard versus dropping the RAM chips directly on to the motherboard.

Not to mention putting the RAM directly on a System-in-Package chip like Apple does now. That's going to be unbeatable in terms of space and possibly have an edge when it comes to power consumption too. I wouldn't be surprised if future standards will require on-package RAM.

I kind of wish we could establish a new level in the memory hierarchy. Like, just make a slot where you can add slower more power hungry DDR RAM that acts as a big cache for the NVM storage, or that the OS can offload some of the stuff in main memory if it's not used much. It could be unpopulated in base models, and then you can buy an upgrade to stick in there to get some extra performance later if needed.

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