FB-DIMMs make surprise appearance

ONE OF THE SHOCKS of IDF was seeing my first working, though pre-production, FB-DIMM module. It was interesting because it had something I had no idea would be included, basically a heatsink on the buffer chip itself.

To be fair, the production ones will have a much sleeker, lower profile HS, but the fact that it was there surprised me. A little more digging came up with a number range of 3.5-4w for power dissipation per buffer chip.

A little more digging came up with some hidden capabilities of the chip, namely some pretty advanced thermal management capabilities. The chips monitor their temperature, and if they get to hot, the FB-DIMM controller can throttle each DIMM down independently until it cools. It also gives the system the ability to monitor temperatures over many more areas of the motherboard. µ

See Also
FB DIMM 1
FB DIMM 2
FB DIMM 3