Hardware dell'anno 2000

What is there to expect from the CPU, Chipset and Motherboard markets in 2001?

We recently ran a poll on the AnandTech Home Page that asked a number of questions related to the Best of 2000. Among those questions was the most hyped product of 2000, interestingly enough, DDR SDRAM was voted as one of the most hyped products of 2000.

Currently DDR SDRAM is noticeably more expensive than regular PC133 SDRAM and motherboards with support for the memory are either rare or insanely expensive. If DDR SDRAM is to succeed, you can expect it to gain some more ground in 2001. However we may not see the performance benefits the technology could offer until it is paired with a more bandwidth hungry processor, either that or a more bandwidth hungry set of applications to run.

Of course RDRAM was listed as one of the most hyped products of 2000. At the time of publication tying DDR SDRAM with 20% of the surveyed electing it as the most hyped. However, unlike DDR SDRAM, RDRAM has a processor that is already quite dependent on it to succeed, the Pentium 4. It seems like contrary to what the belief was during this time last year, RDRAM will be here to stay.