AMD "Steamroller/Excavator" -info, speculations and experience

[The Stilt]

The main problem I see with quad channel memory is that people then need 4 memory sticks. While this is not a big deal for desktops, only high end laptops with dGPUs have 4 slots.

Unless maybe AMD is planning their own special 128bit memory? I don't think they have the clout to pull that off though. The industry adopting 128bit memory would be great though. Huge performance gains for IGPs and even a bit for CPUs. Cheaper boards can just support single channel to keep motherboard costs as they are today, but only 1 memory stick would be needed to match current bandwidth. Higher end motherboards can support dual channel for 256bit total memory bandwidth.

Entry level setups rarely feature a high-end APU.
Only the high-end (Spectre) GPU is fast enough to make the quad channel mandatory.
The downcored / clocked versions will be just fine with DDR-2133 dual channel DRAM, just like the current high-end GPUs are.

4x DDR-1333 modules are generally cheaper than 2x DDR-2133 modules, while the bandwidth is nearly 25% greater.