Embedded Intel Atom® Processors
Technological Conversations about Intel Atom® Hardware, Software, Firmware, Graphics
1149 Discussions

Is Atom E3800 compatible with DDR3L chips with 8Gbit density?

TKuhn
Novice
1,529 Views

Page 279 of the Atom E3800 datasheet explicitly states support for "Standard 1Gb, 2Gb and 4Gb [DDR3L memory] technologies and addressing"

I'm designing a board that uses an E3825 (only supports single channel DDR3), with memory down, and want 4GB of RAM. I'd like to use as few DDR3 chips as possible, and thus would like to use four 8Gbit chips (like the Micron MT41K512M16, which is 64Meg x 16 x 8 banks ). However, the E3800 datasheet (p.279) shows instead to use eight 4Gbit chips to achieve 4GBytes of RAM. Looking at the pinout of the RAM chips, I don't see why using 8Gbit parts would be a problem. However, I'm new to designing with DDR3 memory, and am just not sure if there would be a problem

I searched for an answer to this on the forum before posting, apologies if this is a repeat question.

Also, apologies for newbie-DDR3-designer question.

Thanks for any insight!

Ted

0 Kudos
1 Solution
CarlosAM_INTEL
Moderator
530 Views

Hello Ted,

 

 

Thanks for your reply.

The information that may help you is stated in section 12.2.2 Rules for Populating SO-DIMM Slots, on pages 267, 268, 269 of the http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/secure/embedded/nda/products/bay-trail/atom-e3800-eds.html Bay Trail-I SoC External Design Specification (EDS) document # 557519.

Please let us know if this information is useful to you.

Best Regards,

 

Carlos A.

 

 

View solution in original post

0 Kudos
6 Replies
idata
Employee
530 Views

Hello Ted Kuhn,

Welcome back to the Intel® Embedded Community.

We're working on getting an answer to your question. Have a great day and we'll be talking with you soon!

Regards.

Leon

0 Kudos
CarlosAM_INTEL
Moderator
530 Views

Hello Ted,

 

 

Thank you for contacting Intel Embedded Community.

 

 

The Intel(R) Atom(TM) Processor E3825 supports up to 8 GB. You can confirm this information in Memory Specifications section, specifically in the Max Memory Size row of the http://ark.intel.com/products/78474/Intel-Atom-Processor-E3825-1M-Cache-1_33-GHz Intel Ark web site.

Please let us know if this information is useful to you.

 

 

Best Regards,

 

Carlos A.
0 Kudos
TKuhn
Novice
530 Views

Hello Carlos,

Thanks for your reply, however, that's an answer to a different question. I understand the E3825 supports up to a total of 8 GBytes of RAM. I'm trying to achieve only 4 GBytes of RAM. The question I'm trying to get answered is: what densities of individual DDR3 RAM chips are compatible to achieve this on a single DDR3 channel, and a single rank?

Page 279 of the E3800 datasheet says that to achieve 4GB on a single rank, one should use: 8 individual DDR3 chips, each with 4Gbit density and a data width of 8 bits per chip (8 chips * 4Gbits/chip = 4Gbytes). I would rather use 4 individual RAM chips, each of 8Gbit density (and width of 16 bits each), however the datasheet doesn't explicitly mention support for this density of chip (8Gbit); I'm wondering if it will cause issues.

Thanks!

Ted

0 Kudos
CarlosAM_INTEL
Moderator
531 Views

Hello Ted,

 

 

Thanks for your reply.

The information that may help you is stated in section 12.2.2 Rules for Populating SO-DIMM Slots, on pages 267, 268, 269 of the http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/secure/embedded/nda/products/bay-trail/atom-e3800-eds.html Bay Trail-I SoC External Design Specification (EDS) document # 557519.

Please let us know if this information is useful to you.

Best Regards,

 

Carlos A.

 

 

0 Kudos
TKuhn
Novice
530 Views

Hello Carlos,

Thanks very much for pointing me to the additional information.

This document has slightly different information than what I see listed in the E3800 datasheet. In the EDS, Table 162 (P.267), I see listed only 4Gbit, x16 DRAM device support; that is a bit confusing to me. However, on the next page, Table 165: Supported DDR3L SO-DIMM size, there's a row that lists exactly what I'm trying to do: total of 4GB RAM, using four 8Gbit chips in a single rank.

I'm designing the memory to be soldered onto the same board as the processor (i.e. not SO-DIMM), but I don't see why it would make a difference whether or not the chips are on the board, or on a connected SO-DIMM.

It seems like I'm good to go with the four 8Gbit chips.

Thanks!

Ted

CarlosAM_INTEL
Moderator
530 Views

Hello Ted,

We are glad to hear that the provided information was useful to you.

Please do not hesitate to contact us again if you will have more questions related to Intel Embedded devices.

Best Regards,

Carlos A.

0 Kudos
Reply