Samsung Electronics, the world leader in advanced memory technology, today announced its development of the industry’s first 512-gigabyte (GB) Compute Express Link (CXL) DRAM, taking an important step toward the commercialization of CXL which will enable extremely high memory capacity with low latency in IT systems.

Since introducing the industry’s first CXL DRAM prototype with a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) controller in May 2021, Samsung has been working closely with data center, enterprise server and chipset companies to develop an improved, customizable CXL device.

The new CXL DRAM is built with an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) CXL controller and is the first to pack 512GB of DDR5 DRAM, featuring four times the memory capacity and one-fifth the system latency over the previous Samsung CXL offering.

“CXL DRAM will become a critical turning point for future computing structures by substantially advancing artificial intelligence (AI) and big data services, as we aggressively expand its usage in next-generation memory architectures including software-defined memory (SDM),” said Cheolmin Park, Vice President of Memory Global Sales & Marketing at Samsung Electronics, and Director of the CXL Consortium. “Samsung will continue to collaborate across the industry to develop and standardize CXL memory solutions, while fostering an increasingly solid ecosystem.”

“As an active member of the CXL Consortium, Lenovo is committed to developing this important standard and helping build the ecosystem around the new CXL interconnect,” said Greg Huff, Chief Technology Officer, Lenovo Infrastructure Solutions Group. “We are excited to be part of Samsung’s CXL development program, working to foster the growth and adoption of innovative CXL products in future Lenovo systems.”

“CXL is a key technology that enables more innovative ways to manage memory expansion and pooling which will play an important role in next-generation server platforms,” said Christopher Cox, Vice President of Strategic Technology at Montage Technology. “Montage is excited to continue partnering with Samsung to help the CXL ecosystem expand rapidly.”

In recent years, the growth of the metaverse, AI and big data has been generating explosive amounts of data. However, conventional DDR design limits the scaling of memory capacity beyond the tens of terabyte range, requiring an entirely new memory interface technology like CXL.

The large pool of memory that is shared between CXL and main memory allows a server to expand its memory capacity to tens of terabytes, and at the same time increase its bandwidth to several terabytes per second.

Samsung’s 512GB CXL DRAM will be the first memory device that supports the PCIe 5.0 interface and will come in an EDSFF (E3.S) form factor — especially suitable for next-generation high-capacity enterprise servers and data centers.

Later this month, Samsung plans to unveil an updated version of its open-source Scalable Memory Development Kit (SMDK). The toolkit is a comprehensive software package that allows the CXL memory expander to work seamlessly in heterogeneous memory systems — enabling system developers to incorporate CXL memory into various IT systems running AI, big data and cloud applications, without having to modify existing application environments.

Samsung will begin sampling its 512GB CXL DRAM with customers and partners for joint evaluation and testing in the third quarter of this year, and plans to have the memory ready for commercialization as next-generation server platforms become available. As a member of the CXL Consortium Board of Directors, Samsung is openly collaborating with many global data center, server and chipset vendors to deliver next-generation interface technologies that can bring highly tangible benefits to the IT industry.

COVID-19 has sped up digital transformation by several years, and advances in AI technology have sped right along with it, leading to a significant increase in demand for AI. Large-scale adoption of AI is already taking place in key industries, from the automotive sector and finance to healthcare and education, as seen through innovations like self-driving cars and chatbots. At the same time, the range of applications for AI is expanding fast, driving impressive advancements in areas like image processing, speech recognition, and natural language processing.

A New Memory Solution for the AI Era

In recent years, as data throughput has increased rapidly, it’s stressed the limits of existing computing systems. AI data throughput has been rising tenfold each year,¹ and current computing systems don’t offer memory capacities large enough to handle the sharp increase in data volumes.

Currently, a central processing unit (CPU) can hold up to 16 DRAMs (a maximum of 8 terabytes (TB)) — a number far smaller than what’s needed to handle the massive stores of data used in AI and machine learning. The need for a memory platform that supports fast interfaces and easy scalability is becoming all the more clear as the age of AI draws ever nearer. Recently, a new DRAM module based on Compute Express Link (CXL) has emerged as a promising memory solution for the AI era. So too have processing-in-memory (PIM) and computing storage equipped with a memory-based AI processor.

CXL: An Interface Pushing the Boundaries of Memory Capacity and Server Flexibility

What makes CXL a next-generation memory platform and such a promising solution to current computing limitations? In short: scalability.

CXL is a new interface that’s designed to enhance the efficiency of a computing system’s memory, CPU and graphics processing unit (GPU). In conventional platforms, devices like memory and storage have their own interfaces that link them to the CPU. But going through all these different interfaces to communicate with one another creates latency, slowing down operations. And with the massive growth in data being used for AI and machine learning, latency issues have only gotten worse.

CXL is part of a next-generation interface that will be applied to PCIe 5.0. By integrating multiple existing interfaces into one, directly connecting devices and enabling them to share memory, CXL addresses those limitations and creates new data pathways that are faster and more efficient. This next-generation memory solution is the reason why CXL has been receiving so much attention.

In line with this trend, in May of 2021, Samsung Electronics introduced the CXL Memory Expander, a first-of-its-kind CXL-based software development solution, and began promoting CXL memory solutions. The main advantages of CXL are as follows:

• Unrivaled Memory Expansion

Similar to a solid state drive (SSD), which is an external storage device, the CXL Memory Expander enables DRAM capacity to be expanded when installed in the location where the SSD is inserted. In other words, it enables an IT system’s DRAM capacity to be expanded simply by improving the interface and without having to modify the existing server structure or change it altogether.

• Streamlined Data Handling

A key benefit of the Memory Expander is its efficient data processing. By expanding higher bandwidth, it enables different devices to share memory and leverage their resources more effectively. They can then use the accelerator’s memory as if it were main memory by sharing common memory areas. Devices without their own internal memory can also take advantage of that main memory and use it as their own.

• Accelerated Computing Speed

Minimizing latency issues (or delays) caused by increases in data throughput is a key function of the CXL Memory Expander. The Memory Expander leverages both the accelerator and the CPU to improve system computing speeds, supporting much smoother and more rapid data processing.

As it stands, many in the industry are still unfamiliar with the concept of the CXL interface. Although the technology is still in its early stages, its potential to drive more efficient data processing is pushing it to be viewed as a driver of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

In preparation for the rapidly approaching AI era, Samsung Electronics will help expand the CXL ecosystem by introducing everything from CXL memory hardware to a software solution called the Scalable Memory Development Kit (SMDK), and will lead the market with next-generation memory solutions that are capable of accommodating the fast-evolving landscape of data processing.

¹ Source: OpenAI (2019)

The CXL interconnect is an open, industry-backed standard that enables different types of devices such as accelerators, memory expanders and smart I/O devices to work more efficiently when processing high-performance computational workloads.

“In order for data center and enterprise systems to smoothly run next-generation memory solutions like CXL, development of corresponding software is a necessity,” said Cheolmin Park, Vice President of the Memory Product Planning Team at Samsung Electronics. “Today, Samsung is reinforcing its commitment toward delivering a total memory solution that encompasses hardware and software, so that IT OEMs can incorporate new technologies into their systems much more effectively.”

CXL Memory Adoption Made Easier Without the Need for Application Modifications

Samsung’s SMDK enables the main memory and the CXL memory expander to work together seamlessly in heterogeneous memory systems. The extensive software kit consists of libraries — sets of pre-built, reusable codes — and application programming interfaces (APIs) — the connections to access these software codes. Using the SMDK, system developers can easily incorporate CXL memory into advanced IT systems without having to modify existing application environments, or alternatively use it to optimize application software settings to suit special system needs.

Industry’s First Software-Defined Memory Management

The new SMDK also supports memory virtualization, allowing system designers to efficiently manage an expanded memory pool in shared memory architectures. Leveraging a proprietary Intelligent Tiering Engine, the SMDK can identify and configure the memory type, capacity and bandwidth that are most appropriate for each use case.

Samsung’s SMDK is now available on a limited basis for initial testing and optimization and will be open-sourced within the first half of next year. Samsung will continue to enhance its open-source SMDK as it closely collaborates with industry leaders in expanding adoption of the CXL memory platform for broad use in AI, edge and cloud applications.