WHILE ITS PRICING slowly comes down to earth, DDR3 memory is still way more expensive than its older, just a bit slower DDR2 cousins. Now, if it’s high-end users buying those DDR3 DIMMs due to the price, it would mean the memories go into the high-end PC boxen.

And, this year, such systems start at 4 GB RAM - before long, you’ll see more of them with 8 GB, and then, with Nehalem’s triple channel config, even 12 GB.

So, what’s the point then of overpaying for, say, a Nforce 790i Ultra mobo with two 9800GX2 or GTX280 cards and then, just plug in two equally expensive 1 GB DDR3-2000 sticks when Vista GUI alone will eat all of that? Your games will start swapping in no time.

Yes, you can put four instead for double the price - at the added cost of closed-off future memory expansion.

This Computex, high-density DDR3 will finally catch up in speed with those less useful low capacity ones: the few biggies of the enthusiast memory, inclusive Corsair, Kinston, OCZ and a few of the local players, are expected to show the first samples of DDR3-2000 grade 4 GB kits, that is 2 GB per DIMM.

Corsair has just announced its offering, with expected shipping later in summer. Be ready to spend $1,300 or so for 8 GB of this pretty stuff, or nearly $330 per 2 GB DIMM.

Now that you could fill your mobo to the max capacity brim with 8 GB of the highest-bandwidth DDR3-2000 memory in your expensive Nforce 790i or X48 system, without any speed sacrifices, you may see some brand new specs of the upcoming gaming machines. Maximum memory matched 1:1 with the FSB, and that FSB at the 2000+ mark - sounds great? Oh, the only thing to complain about, it’s still over triple the price of the best similar DDR2 memory