What does it mean for ram to be N x M?

[cyboman]

N x M ram

i'm new to digital design. i'm reading a book about it, it has to do with fpgas. i came across a following term:

16 x 1 RAM look-up table

i know what ram and look-up tables are. however if i remember correctly, when i buy a computer i never i say i want my ram to be 16 x 1 or 16 x 2. i just say i want 3GB or maybe 4 GB.

can anyone explain what does it mean for ram to be N x M? can it be 4 KB x 16 KB or maybe it is 4 KB x 16 bits. are there any other available permutations. i would appreciate any insights.

thanks

 

[bassa]

hope this help

regards
bassa

 

[amraldo]

That's Called RAM Organization
NxM RAM contains N Locations each is M bits.

Total RAM size in bytes = N x M / 8

 

[cyboman]

i recently saw another variation on this

32K x 8

what does that mean? does it mean that there are 32000 address locations each 8 bits wide or it means 32 * 1024 locations each 8 bits wide?

thanks

ps. amraldo and bassa thanks for the help.

 

[keith1200rs]

Strictly speaking, small k is kilo=1000. Large K=1024. So 32Kx8 is 32*1024 x 8 bits.

Keith

 

[bassa]

Yes. As a example give in my reply

M = 32k = 32*1024 locations
N = 8 bit data
M*N = 32*1024*8 bits = 32*1024 bytes

which is = 32k RAM

regards
bassa

 

[keith1200rs]

Strictly speaking 32k=32000. 32K=32768.

Keith

Added after 25 minutes:

It gets more confusing for G and M as there is no convention for which is really based on a power of 10 and which is based on 2^10 etc. I have so 2GB memory cards which have 15% more capacity than others simply due to how the manufacturers interpret GB.

Keith