Elpida Memory, a leading manufacturer of memory products, Friday said it had begun sampling of XDR memory at 4.80GHz. The claim emphasizes advantages that the XDR memory architecture from Rambus has, however, given that currently just a few devices actually use XDR, it is unclear whether the new chips from Elpida will face any tangible demand.

“The industry’s demand for memory bandwidth in next-generation products is growing rapidly as high-definition image data becomes more popular. Working with Rambus on XDR DRAM, we can provide the most cost-effective, high-bandwidth memory solution to our customers,” said Yoshitaka Kinoshita, officer for the digital consumer division of Elpida Memory.

The new 4.80GHz memory chips sport 512Mb capacity and can provide 9.6GB/s bandwidth per device. Elpida’s new memory devices are organized in 8-banks (x16/x8/x4 programmable) and are available in a 104-ball FBGA package. The new XDR chips are manufactured using Elpida’s 70nm process technology.

Elpida and Rambus claim that the new memory chips are “ideal” for high-performance, high-volume applications such as high-definition televisions, gaming consoles, PCs, servers and workstations. However, so far the main client for XDR memory has been Sony Computer Entertainment Inc., which uses XDR in its PlayStation 3 game console.

Elpida’s 512Mb 4.80GHz XDR DRAM devices will be available for sampling in December 2007. Volume production is expected to begin in April 2008. A datasheet is available upon request.