Intel Optane Persistent Memory starts at $850 for 128GB

mongeese

Posts: 643   +123
Staff
Forward-looking: Intel Optane Persistent Memory is now available for pre-order for $842 for a 128GB stick and $2,461 for a 256GB stick. That might sound like a lot, and it is compared prices for regular 16GB or 32GB DDR4 sticks, but in the server world that’s a tenth of the usual price.

Intel Optane Persistent Memory (OPM) is Intel’s low-latency high-speed storage put in a memory form factor. The pitch is simple: in case a mission-critical system fails, whatever data was in the memory isn’t lost; and for memory intensive applications, it offers shockingly high capacity at low prices. The compromise is higher latency and lower raw speed compared to traditional volatile memory.

Courtesy of two online US retailers who’ve put the memory up for pre-order, we now know what the prices are. While 128GB and 256GB regular memory sticks are possible to purchase, they take extreme to a whole new level at $4,326 and $24,257, respectively. OPM is 80-90% cheaper and throws 512GB into the mix, though we don’t yet know the price of that module.

  128GB Price/GB 256GB Price/GB
OPM at CompSource $893 $6.98 $2,461 $9.61
OPM at ShopBLT $842 $6.58 $2,668 $10.42
Standard Single Stick $4,326 $33.80 $24,257 $94.75
Standard Multi-Stick $699 $5.46 $1,816 $7.09
Standard M.2 $51.99 $0.41 $87.99 $0.34

As cool as OPM is, it is not at all intended to reach consumers at this point. Even if a professional required 256GB of RAM, a 8 x 32GB DDR4 kit is a grand cheaper at $1,816. It’s a lot faster, too. OPM occupies its niche fantastically, but it it will be a long time before it can expand to other markets.

Servers featuring Intel OPM are expected to arrive in June, but we don’t know when the single sticks will be available, and the retailers aren’t listing a release date. Performance is also a big question, not in terms of numbers and specs, but rather how various workloads will be affected by the lower speeds and increased capacity compared to traditional memory.

Permalink to story.

 
Well, admittedly it's a heck of a good deal but I honestly can't think of any application other than large supporting servers that could really use it ....... no?
 
This is tested like a ssd drive. so ssd and dim are almost the same now. both are saving before going to sleep mode and so on. if its a power glitch it will resume where it last stopped. so it s nice to turn off an get back again. windows 10 and antivirus trojan needed to be scan the memory too. what if a trojan gets locked down on turn off computer. would it not compete with ssd ram motherboard tings then. could you save like a ingame and proseed with tasks from full turn of from hyper mode. you save 1st on hd network and then dram. would it not be good to hav a real rdram module and running old ddr1-ddr4 to get real performance on older motherborads. if they making ddr4 with this why not make it for older ddr ram sdram edoram modules. and get a update for every os in the world ? mac linuix unbutu win support with new motherboards released soon.
 
Last edited:
When you're a business, you purchase computers like this, fully loaded, without batting an eye.
I've worked in small and large businesses, and while this might sound good, my experience is that in all cases, there is quite a bit of consideration that goes into the decision.
 
Back