Intel has already qualified a wide number of different vendor DDR memory modules and its own 845 DDR chipset, Louis Burns, vice president and general manager of Intel desktop products group, told EBN Tuesday. But he said systems firms need several months to qualify the Intel 845 DDR and memory modules in their own products.

The planned 845 DDR shipments in the fourth quarter explained the spate of reports from memory firms and analysts that Intel would be delivering the new chipset this year, earlier than its long-stated official launch very early in 2002. Burns said that debut will follow Intel's once-traditional launch pattern of lining up a host of OEM customers with available systems for immediate shipment.

"When we introduce the 845 DDR chipset in Q1 '02, OEMs will be ready to deliver systems in massive volume," Burns said. "We expect to see significant performance increases for DDR (over single data rate SDRAM systems)."

Burns said the DDR chipset requires a large amount of testing and validation to be sure it works flawlessly when introduced. "It's not just a simple case of connecting a chipset to a processor front side bus," he added, pointing out that the high speed timing and sophisticated DDR interfaces must be precisely designed and controlled in the chipset.

"We wanted to be certain that customers could mix and match DDR modules from any qualified vendor," he added. An early DDR problem was the incompatibility of different vendors' modules being interchanged on boards, although memory makers almost unanimously claim that issue was now been solved.

Intel took some credit for solving DDR module incompatibility by promoting several spec addendum changes to the JEDEC spec. Jeff Austin, marketing manager for the Intel desktop platform group, said the changes related to electrical characteristics and DC operating conditions as well as AC overshoot andundershoot under some conditions. He said all major DDR chip and module suppliers have agreed to the changes for DDR200 chips and a similar revision is expected later this year for DDR266.

Austin said the Brookdale 845 DDR chipset will support the full range of Pentium 4 desktop processors at present speed grades and even higher frequencies to come. He said the same chipset can support the 0.13-micron Northwood Pentium 4 to be shipped in volume early next year.

"The chipset will be able to support the 3.5-GHz Pentium 4 and even future versions as high as 10-Ghz" that had been forecast earlier at the Intel Developers Forum, he added.