What’s different between PC-5300E, PC-5300F and PC-5300P memory RAM?

Question

I recently found out that there are many types of memory on PC servers. I see there is RAM memory that says PC-5300E, PC-5300F, PC-5300P, and there is also buffered and fully buffered memory. What does all that mean?

(left)PC-5300E, (mid)PC-5300F, (right)PC-5300P

Answer 1

First off, the letters:

• PC-5300: This is a classification of DDR2 RAM memory, indicating a speed of 5300 MB/s (megabytes per second).
• E, F, P: These letters represent the operating voltage of the RAM module:
  • E: 1.8 V
  • F: 1.9 V
  • P: 1.8 V (with a reduced power consumption)

As for buffered and fully buffered memory, the key difference lies in their design. Buffered memory has a small register that temporarily holds data before it's written to the main memory, reducing electrical loading on the memory bus and improving performance. Fully buffered memory, however, has a buffer chip on each DIMM that buffers all data transferred between the CPU and memory, which can lead to increased latency and power consumption.

Fully buffered memory was used in older systems, but buffered memory is a more modern and efficient technology that offers better performance, lower power consumption, and higher memory densities, making it a preferred choice for servers and workstations that require high performance and low latency, in most cases.

Keep in mind that these terms are specific to DDR2 RAM, and newer types of RAM (like DDR3, DDR4, etc.) have different classifications and features, so any of this information is irrelevant.