Gigabyte and VIA show off DDR converter

It's not often you see a very cool bit of problem-solving technology, but this is certainly one of them.

VIA and Gigabyte have teamed up to make the GA-8VT880P Combo motherboard for Intel platforms. It's designed to offer upgraders an easier route to the latest Intel platform, seeing as it supports both DDR1 and DDR2 on the same board. How does it do this?

Well, the VIA PT880 chipset suports both memory types, and Gigabyte have created a RAM pin converter which you can stick in the slots. We saw the converter first on HKEPC a while back, but we haven't actually seen one in the flesh until now.

We didn't get a chance to fully test the memory converter, so we're unsure if there is any performance penalty - although since both types of DDR are integrated right in the chipset, we suspect there won't be.

This could be a great way for people to start migrating to the newest Intel technology whilst keeping their current RAM, and with Pentium D prices looking extremely promising, could this herald a new era of cheap Intel system building?

We went to see VIA yesterday, and we have some more cool details on their newest technologies coming up. Stay tuned...

What do you make of this technology? Are you looking forward to seeing VIA back in the enthusiast game? Comment in the News Forums!