If I told you that the empty RAM slots in your system were limiting how fast your RAM could go, you'd likely think I was a few pins short of a DIMM slot, but that's exactly what Asus claims with its new Nitropath motherboard memory slots. Looking at the science behind the claims, it turns out the company might be on to something.

What is NitroPath exactly?

What's in a name?

Detailed in an official Asus blog post, NitroPath is essentially a redesign of the DRAM memory slot, with the intent to improve performance. According to ASUS, currently Nitropath can raise DDR5 speeds by up to 400 MT/s. That's megatransfers per second. While that's not a lot in the grand scheme of things, it's certainly a good thing for memory stability when you're pushing things to the edge.

According to Asus, in a traditional DRAM slot, the little "stubs" that extend from each pin can cause "signal reflection." In other words, they can be a source of radio interference.

Until now, this hasn't really been an issue, but Asus says that once you push past the DDR5-8000 performance level, it becomes a problem. What's actually happening is that signal reflection from the empty slot messes with the signal of a filled memory module. This can lead to memory instability and failure at those speeds.

Why is this an issue in the first place?

Digging a little deeper

Honestly, this whole thing caught me by surprise, and the first thing I was wondering was why it's even possible for an empty slot to create this interference. I found a good explanation in this wonderful video by overclocking legend Der Bauer.

It shakes out like this: let's say you have a dual-channel motherboard with four slots. This means that every memory channel has two physical slots wired to it. If you only fill one slot per channel, then the empty slot is still powered. There's no way to turn off one slot in that channel without turning them all off. So there's power going into that slot, and therefore radio waves from hundreds of tiny stubs.

How NitroPath fixes the issue

Just a small twist

In NitroPath slots, the stubs are folded inwards, instead of upwards and away from the pins in traditional slots. The smart thing about this approach is that there are no changes needed to the DRAM modules at all. So you don't have to worry that you'll need to spend even more on special RAM.

Of course, an alternative solution would be to simply fill all of your RAM slots, but I guess not everyone who buys a motherboard with four RAM slots wants to fill them right away, or ever, for that matter. That said, 32GB of RAM is the working minimum for performance computers these days, and that's four 8GB modules. Also, 64GB of RAM isn't an unreasonable, if you prefer 16GB modules. So, if you currently have a four-slot motherboard and the benefits of NitroPath sound interesting, simply adding more RAM to the empty slots should in theory have the same effect, and you get the added bonus of more memory.

Is it worth the hassle?

This new DRAM slot design is coming to non-Asus boards eventually, since it seems the company has a year of exclusivity. Whether it's worth going out of your way to get one of these motherboards is an open question at this point. I mainly see this as something that would appeal to overclockers who want to get that final bit of stability, but then these users will likely have dual-slot boards. For dual-channel motherboards with two slots, this is a non-issue and, as such, you won't find NitroPath technology in them.

I also wonder if dummy RAM does anything to mitigate the issue. It will be interesting to see what happens in the real world once people buy these boards and can test the claims around improved RAM speeds and stability.