Acting as a cache on the motherboard is exactly what the Intel Optane memory is designed for. It can turbocharge your storage by acting as a temporary space for content to be copied before using it in applications/game on your system. While the concept is not new, Intel’s implementation is the first time that the form factor is designed to be used on the motherboard itself.

m.2 On Board

Using the SATA connector but in the m.2 PCIe form factor, the Intel Optane memory slips easily into any free PICe slot on your motherboard to increase the I/O operations that your system can handle. It will act like a cache rather than a normal NVMe storage. What this turns your system into is having your large spinning storage to have SSD-like speeds accessing data.

3D XPoint Tech

The Optane memory decreases the latency of data accessed on your system by a factor of over a hundred, making your system faster than ever before thanks to the 3D Xpoint technology from Intel. We would like to see more access and customization from Intel in accessing the Optane memory from the desktop in the future though – more granular access would be appreciated

Highlight 1 – Optane-supported?

Make sure your motherboard is Optane supported as motherboards needs to be certified to accept Optane

Highlight 2 – 16/32GB only

As it is meant to be a cache, the Optane memory only comes in either 16GB or 32GB flavours

Highlight 3 – Boost your system

A simple design meant to boost your system performance? Yes please

Byline: Sharil

Specs

Price: RM TBA
Connector: m.2 PCIe
Storage: 32GB
Transfer speeds: 1.4/Gbps
Connectivity: SATA

Score

V – 8
P – 8
F – 9
D – 9
U – 9

Total – 8.6 (Gold)

Verdict: Plug this in to charge up your system