Micron launches new GDDR6 memory for AMD's Radeon RX 6000 series GPUs

Just as Intel is launching its new 12th Gen Core "Alder Lake" CPUs and next-gen Z690 chipset which delivers DDR5 memory and PCIe 5.0 connectivity for the first time, Micron has announced new GDDR6 16Gbps memory for AMD Radeon RX 6000 series GPUs.

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In a new press release, Micron announced that its high-performance 16Gb/16Gbps GDDR6 memory is now available to RDNA 2-based Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards. Micron uses its advanced 1z process technology for its 16Gbps GDDR6 memory, offering up to 512GB/sec of memory bandwidth.

But there's something definitely worth pointing out here: this is nothing new. There's nothing new, or upgraded coming from AMD with new 16Gbps GDDR6-based memory from Micron on a new Radeon RX 6000 series graphics card. Micron is just announcing that its 16Gbps GDDR6 memory is now available to AMD for its Radeon RX 6000 series cards.

Mark Montierth vice president and general manager of High-Performance Memory and Networking at Micron said: "Micron is passionate about driving product innovation in leading-edge graphics for our customers. Our GDDR6 Ultra-Bandwidth Solution, in collaboration with AMD GPU capability, will provide an enhanced user experience and advanced performance in gaming".

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Scott Herkelman, corporate vice president and general manager of the Graphics Business Unit at AMD added: "Radeon RX 6000 Series graphics cards were built to deliver high-performance, no-compromises gaming experiences, and the addition of Micron memory to the product line will help us meet that objective".

"Micron has a strong history of developing advanced memory products, and we worked closely with their engineering team to optimize GDDR6 for RDNA 2 architecture-based graphics cards, giving our board partners more choice and flexibility to produce additional designs for gamers".

AMD already has 16GB of GDDR6 memory at 16Gbps on their Radeon RX 6000 series graphics cards, it's just from a different manufacturer. Samsung and SK Hynix both make GDDR6 memory, but Micron has been busy serving a very hungry NVIDIA with even-faster GDDR6X memory -- that single X makes a gigantic difference.

Micron's ultra-fast GDDR6X memory is already pumping away at 19.5Gbps inside of NVIDIA's flagship GeForce RTX 3090, and with 24GB of GDDR6X sitting next to the Ampere GA102 GPU. The GeForce RTX 3080 Ti has 12GB of GDDR6X, and the GeForce RTX 3080 has 10GB of GDDR6X memory clocked slightly slower than the RTX 3090, down to 19Gbps (from 19.5Gbps on the RTX 3090).

NVIDIA has the fastest memory by far inside of its flagship GeForce RTX 30 series graphics cards, with the 19Gbps GDDR6X and 19.5Gbps GDDR6X memory from Micron easily pushed to 21Gbps -- and I know personally, as I've done it many times on my 20+ GeForce RTX 3080, RTX 3080 Ti, and RTX 3090 graphics cards since release.