Computer memory

In computing, memory refers to the computer hardware integrated circuits that store information for immediate use in a computer; it is synonymous with the term 'primary storage'. Computer memory operates at a high speed, for example random-access memory (RAM), as a distinction from storage that provides slow-to-access information but offers higher capacities. If needed, contents of the computer memory can be transferred to secondary storage; a very common way of doing this is through a memory management technique called 'virtual memory'. An archaic synonym for memory is store. In computing, memory refers to the computer hardware integrated circuits that store information for immediate use in a computer; it is synonymous with the term 'primary storage'. Computer memory operates at a high speed, for example random-access memory (RAM), as a distinction from storage that provides slow-to-access information but offers higher capacities. If needed, contents of the computer memory can be transferred to secondary storage; a very common way of doing this is through a memory management technique called 'virtual memory'. An archaic synonym for memory is store. The term 'memory', meaning 'primary storage' or 'main memory', is often associated with addressable semiconductor memory, i.e. integrated circuits consisting of silicon-based transistors, used for example as primary storage but also other purposes in computers and other digital electronic devices. There are two main kinds of semiconductor memory, volatile and non-volatile. Examples of non-volatile memory are flash memory (used as secondary memory) and ROM, PROM, EPROM and EEPROM memory (used for storing firmware such as BIOS). Examples of volatile memory are primary storage, which is typically dynamic random-access memory (DRAM), and fast CPU cache memory, which is typically static random-access memory (SRAM) that is fast but energy-consuming, offering lower memory areal density than DRAM. Most semiconductor memory is organized into memory cells or bistable flip-flops, each storing one bit (0 or 1). Flash memory organization includes both one bit per memory cell and multiple bits per cell (called MLC, Multiple Level Cell). The memory cells are grouped into words of fixed word length, for example 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64 or 128 bit. Each word can be accessed by a binary address of N bit, making it possible to store 2 raised by N words in the memory. This implies that processor registers normally are not considered as memory, since they only store one word and do not include an addressing mechanism. Typical secondary storage devices are hard disk drives and solid-state drives. In the early 1940s, memory technology often permitted a capacity of a few bytes. The first electronic programmable digital computer, the ENIAC, using thousands of octal-base radio vacuum tubes, could perform simple calculations involving 20 numbers of ten decimal digits which were held in the vacuum tube accumulators. The next significant advance in computer memory came with acoustic delay line memory, developed by J. Presper Eckert in the early 1940s. Through the construction of a glass tube filled with mercury and plugged at each end with a quartz crystal, delay lines could store bits of information in the form of sound waves propagating through mercury, with the quartz crystals acting as transducers to read and write bits. Delay line memory would be limited to a capacity of up to a few hundred thousand bits to remain efficient. Two alternatives to the delay line, the Williams tube and Selectron tube, originated in 1946, both using electron beams in glass tubes as means of storage. Using cathode ray tubes, Fred Williams would invent the Williams tube, which would be the first random-access computer memory. The Williams tube would prove more capacious than the Selectron tube (the Selectron was limited to 256 bits, while the Williams tube could store thousands) and less expensive. The Williams tube would nevertheless prove to be frustratingly sensitive to environmental disturbances. Efforts began in the late 1940s to find non-volatile memory. Magnetic-core memory allowed for recall of memory after power loss. It was developed by Frederick W. Viehe and An Wang in the late 1940s, and improved by Jay Forrester and Jan A. Rajchman in the early 1950s, before being commercialised with the Whirlwind computer in 1953. Magnetic-core memory would become the dominant form of memory until the development of MOS semiconductor memory in the 1960s. Semiconductor memory began in the early 1960s with bipolar memory, which used bipolar transistors. Bipolar semiconductor memory made from discrete devices was first shipped by Texas Instruments to the United States Air Force in 1961. The same year, the concept of solid-state memory on an integrated circuit (IC) chip was proposed by applications engineer Bob Norman at Fairchild Semiconductor. The first bipolar semiconductor memory IC chip was the SP95 introduced by IBM in 1965. While bipolar memory offered improved performance over magnetic-core memory, it could not compete with the lower price of magnetic-core, which remained dominant up until the late 1960s.