Elpida Memory said Thursday it has shipped first samples of its DDR SDRAM products sporting Super Self Refresh Technology that reduces self refresh current (IDD6) by up to 95% to extend the battery life for portable consumer electronics applications with no trade-off in performance.

“Super Self Refresh technology is a fundamental advancement that will drive the expansion of DDR SDRAM into portable consumer electronics applications, because it enables a drastic change in scale for battery backup requirements,” said Jun Kitano, director of Technical Marketing for Elpida Memory.

Elpida’s new 256Mb DDR SDRAM devices with SSR Technology are organized as 4M x 16 bits x 4 banks and are rated to run at 400MHz with various latency settings. The DRAMs have typical DDR SDRAM memory voltage of 2.5V, but Elpida says the SSR tech adjusts the current rate using Auto Temperature Compensated Self Refresh (ATCSR) depending on the temperature in order to reduce power consumption. Devices with embedded SSR technology require only minuscule self refresh current (IDD6), as low as 40µA (typical) at 25°C, 150µA at 70°C, and 250µA at 85°C. This is merely one twentieth of the current requirement compared with similar devices that do not include SSR technology. SSR also automatically adjusts the self refresh timing to compensate for internal temperature variations, Elpida said.

“By utilizing Elpida's DDR SDRAM with SSR technology, system designers can now decrease battery size, offer dramatically extended battery operation, or boost functionality without sacrificing performance,” Mr. Kitano added.

Samples are available now and volume production is planned for March of this year. Please see pricing and availability schedule for detailed information.