Fast forward for computer memory

By Chris Long Click reporter

Hard disks are much slower than the new generation of flash drives

The memory in our computers is getting faster - it has to, as our processors get more powerful and software more complicated, so memory has to speed up to feed our data-hungry computers.

RAM (Random Access Memory) is the place where your computer stores all the data it needs right now to help you do what you want - be it play a game or write a letter.

It is different to data stored on your hard disk because it goes away when you switch the power off; disks are called storage because the data stays on them when you power them down.

To make your computer run faster, dual channel memory was developed and launched in 2003, and it, as the name implies, splits the RAM memory into two channels.

With single channel memory the data in RAM only has one route to take to the chip. With dual channels it has two.

Many of the RAM modules these days are Double Data Rate (DDR) modules which, again as the name implies, makes data zip through twice as fast. As ever in the hi-tech world the hardware changes and now DDR2 is in wide use.

Dual channel memory has gone through several iterations since it was launched and standards for DDR3, as it is called, were published a few weeks ago.

"Two memory [modules] work in tandem and they both send information to the processor at the same time," said Marc Bernier of memory manufacturer Kingston Technology. "This means that the overall bandwidth is increased."

Faster memory

One obvious way to get more data throughput is just to speed up the memory modules.

"If someone bought a PC 12 months ago it probably came with DDR, so if you're looking to upgrade your PC you want to be looking at DDR memory," said Chris Gibson of Corsair Memory.

"Anything less than 12 months ago will have DDR2 in the system, which is effectively a faster module. In the future - probably six to 12 months away - there'll be DDR3," he said.

Flash forward

It is not just technologies behind RAM that are improving, there are big developments in the USB memory market too.

Solid state discs are on the brink of revolutionising laptops

Inside the USB drive is a storage medium known as flash memory. Already these tiny drives are appearing in eight and 16 gigabyte capacities and they are getting bigger all the time.

To capitalise on this, Microsoft has developed a system to use USB memory sticks to bolster the internal memory of a Vista PC.

Called Ready Boost it helps out by moving regularly accessed files that cannot fit into main memory to the flash memory in a USB stick.

It seems to work best if on a PC running Vista with about half a gigabyte of RAM.

However, most experts suggest Vista works best with at least one gigabyte of RAM, if not two.

Hard disk replacement

Microsoft is not alone in making greater use of flash memory seen in USB sticks.

Flash memory makers like SanDisk and Samsung are just two of the growing numbers of manufacturers that are using flash memory to develop hard disk replacements Solid State Disks (SSD).

These drives are on the brink of revolutionising laptops. They are faster at reading information, cooler and lighter than their mechanical counterparts.

"A solid state disc is actually a disc that is composed of flash media and a controller. It has no moving mechanical parts whatsoever," explained Doreet Oren of SanDisk.

"We see very big delays when you use a hard disc drive. That's because of the seek and latency time of having to actually look on the disk for the different sectors to bring up the very many small files that need to be loaded.

"With a flash drive you don't have any of this mechanical delay. So we're talking about an IO per second that is over a hundred times more than that of a hard disk drive."

The downside of using SSD is that such disks are expensive but, as with many things in the hi-tech world, it is only a matter of time before prices come down the technology becomes much more common.