As you know, GDDR is the memory standard used by graphic video cards.

GDDR4 is now JEDEC sanctioned and commercially “ready” for video card manufacturers. GDDR4 is the memory successor to GDDR3 - both of which are unrelated to the JEDEC DDR3 memory standard.

The new GDDR4 memory has a data transfer rate around 2.4Gbps on a 32-bit bus. Samsung is shipping the new 80nm memory in 512MB configurations, which is likely configured in 16×32 layouts. Samsung also claims that this 2.4Gbps GDDR4 showed a 45% power savings when compared to 2.0Gbps GDD3. The reduction in power is clearly a welcomed trend.

“We’re delighted that we’ll be able to use GDDR4 from Samsung in our latest graphics cards”. “Samsung’s timely introduction will increase the performance of our upcoming products and ultimately improve the gaming experience for our users,” said Joe Macri, ATI Senior Director of Engineering.

But Samsung isn’t the only player in the GDDR market. Hynix announced a week ago that it plans to release the first lot of GDDR4 this year. They lost the number one position on the market last year when Samsung started to supply the majority of the world’s GDDR2/3 memory graphics cards.

Considering that Hynix will provide GDDR4 memory running at 2.9Gbps, Samsung has to push their memory to work at least at the same frequency if they intent to stay on top.

ATI has already announced plans to manufacture with GDDR4 and its current generation R580 GPUs support draft specifications for the memory. NVIDIA will start using GDDR4 into it’s videocards this fall.