Samsung Advances Its Premium Memory Lineup With Latest LPDDR5 Memory

Samsung is launching yet another new mobile DRAM memory this month. The company is today launching the new 12Gb LPDDR5 mobile DRAM, advancing its premium memory lineup even further. Samsung had only launched the 12Gb LPDDR4X five months ago, so the launch of the 12Gb LPDDR5 is pretty quick. This is Samsung’s fifth 10nm mobile DRAM since September 2016, so that should give you an idea of how quickly Samsung is advancing its memory tech.

As for the new LPDDR5 RAM, Samsung says the memory will allow premium flagship phones to fully leverage 5G and AI capabilities. “With mass production of the 12Gb LPDDR5 built on Samsung’s latest second-generation 10-nanometer (nm) class process, we are thrilled to be supporting the timely launch of 5G flagship smartphones for our customers worldwide,” said Jung-bae Lee, executive vice president of DRAM Product & Technology at Samsung Electronics. That’s obviously just for marketing purposes, so here are the technicalities you are probably more interested in.

The new 12Gb LPDDR5 is around 1.3 times faster than the recent 12Gb LPDDR4X, offering a data rate of 5,500 megabits per second (Mb/s), compared to the LPDDR4X’s 4266Mb/s. Samsung says the new memory is capable of transferring 44GB of data in just a second when made into a 12GB package, which combines eight of the 12Gb LPDDR5 chips, and will go into mass production later this month. Samsung also says the new memory is much more power-efficient than before, using 30% less power than its predecessor thanks to a new circuit design with enhanced clocking and a low-power feature.

The company says it will continue to make further advances on its premium memory lineup, starting work on a new 16Gb LPDDR5 mobile DRAM in 2020.