3D XPoint Storage On The Way

[BoFox]

The initial 3D XPoint memory chips pack 128Gb on each chip, and that number is expected to increase as more layers are stacked on each chip.

That is, 16GB per chip.  Phenomenal.  

Both firms are developing products based on 3D XPoint, and the memory will begin sampling "with select customers" later this year.

So next year would be when we'd be seeing retail samples?  

This is too much of a revolution.  

Makes Skylake feel like a waste of an upgrade when this tech is right around the corner..   Cannonlake should feature this if Intel is "developing products based on 3D XPoint".  



Let me see if I can get the next couple years right (if my crystal ball is any good):

I5-variants of desktop Cannonlake with a bit of edram L4 cache, 8GB HBM2 memory, 128GB 3D XPoint memory for storage and instant loading of Windows 10 SP1 and main apps, and 4TB HDD that drops to around $100.  
Customer i7-variants with 16GB HBM2 memory.  256GB 3D XPoint afforable by these customers as well, so still no great need for an SSD when a 4-6GB 7200rpm HDD serves the rest of storage needs.
Enthusiast i7-variants with 32GB HBM2, perhaps 512GB 3DX XPoint as the top line, 2TB M3 SSD's, and also 8TB HDD's for archiving.

This is a massive revolution.  Windows 10 would be just like the Win XP era.  PC's that first ran WinXP compared to the PC's that ran WinXP during the end of the XP era were like night and day, with these early 1GHz single-threaded PC's completely obsolete by then.  Then PC's that first ran Vista (core2quad, still as fast as most of AMD's offerings today) are still considered decent and fine for running most things nowadays, on Windows 8.1..