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Integrated Circuit Systems, Inc. To Provide Advanced Memory Buffer Timing Devices

Posted on: Tuesday, 7 September 2004, 06:00 CDT

Integrated Circuit Systems (NASDAQ:ICST), a world leader in silicon timing solutions for communications, networking, computing, and digital multimedia applications, announces support for a full line of memory interface products supporting Intel's Fully Buffered Dual Inline Memory Module architecture (FB-DIMM). Leveraging ICS's expertise in timing solutions, the new FB-DIMM serial interconnect memory architecture provides high memory bandwidth to meet the increasing demands for larger memory capacity.

Next-generation server platforms using the new FB-DIMM architecture will incorporate at least three different ICS timing devices:

1. The ICS99AMB048 Advanced Memory Buffer (AMB), which follows the Intel/JEDEC specifications, supports full-speed 4.8 Gbs operation for DDR2-800 DRAMs. Fully Buffered DIMMs use commodity DRAMs isolated from the channel behind a buffer on the DIMM. AMB is the buffer that isolates the DRAMs from the channel and is the heart of the new FB-DIMM (FBD) architecture. The AMB interface is responsible for handling FB-DIMM channel and memory requests to and from the local DIMM and for forwarding requests to other DIMMs on the FB-DIMM channel.

2. The ICS932S401 is the base clocking component for next-generation servers that will be incorporating FB-DIMMs. It is compliant with Intel's Next-Generation Server Clock Synthesizer Specification.

3. The ICS9FG1201 and ICS9FG1901 devices generate ICS99AMB048 clocks from an ICS932S401 CPU clock. The ICS9FG1201 drives up to 8 FB-DIMMs, while the ICS9FG1901 drives up to 16 FB-DIMMs. Both devices are compliant with Intel's Differential Buffer Specification for Next-Generation Servers.

New technologies, such as PCI Express, Serial ATA and Serial Attached SCSI, have increased server subsystem performance by means of serial interconnect architecture. As server processing power increases, memory subsystem capacity becomes a critical issue. FB-DIMM memory architecture keeps pace with this new technology by supporting the overall performance increase of the system.

"In response to advancements in server processing power and its increased demands on subsystem memory capacity, ICS, in partnership with Intel and the Joint Electronic Device Engineering Council (JEDEC), supports a full line of FB-DIMM support interface chips," said Ji Park, Director of Memory Timing Products. "These FB-DIMM support chips enable the industry to address future memory performance needs for higher bandwidth and larger capacity."

"The new fully-buffered technology provides an excellent opportunity to increase both the speed of the DIMMs and the memory capacity on server platforms. FB-DIMM will also offer a smooth transition from DDR2 to DDR3 DRAM generations," said Jim Pappas, director of initiatives marketing for Intel's Enterprise Platforms Group. "This has the real potential to be an important new server memory technology in 2006 and onwards and having the industry-wide testing infrastructure in place with companies like ICS will accelerate and ease the introduction of such an innovative and high-performing memory technology."

About ICS:

Integrated Circuit Systems, Inc. is a world leader in the design, development and marketing of silicon timing devices for communications, networking, computing, and digital multimedia applications. The Company is headquartered in Norristown, PA, with key facilities in San Jose, CA, Tempe, AZ, Worcester, MA and Singapore. For more information, visit the company's web site at: http://www.icst.com.

(C) 2004 Integrated Circuit Systems, Inc. All company and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

"Safe Harbor" Statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: Statements in this press release regarding Integrated Circuit Systems' business which are not historical facts are "forward-looking statements" that involve risks and uncertainties. For a discussion of such risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ from those contained in the forward-looking statements, see "Risk Factors" in the Company's Annual Report or Form 10-K for the most recently ended fiscal year.

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