DRAM Costs Surge Past Gold as AI Demand Strains Supply (tomshardware.com) 25
DRAM contract prices surged 171.8% year-over-year as of the third quarter of 2025. The increase now exceeds the rate at which gold prices have climbed. ADATA chairman Chen Libai stated that the fourth quarter of 2025 will mark the beginning of a major DRAM bull market. He expects severe shortages to materialize in 2026.
Memory manufacturers have shifted production priorities toward datacenter-focused memory types like RDIMM and HBM. Consumer DDR5 production has declined as a result. A Corsair Vengeance RGB dual-channel DDR5 kit that sold for $91 dollars in July now costs a $183 dollars on Newegg. The pricing trend extends to NAND flash and hard drives. Analysts project the increases will persist for at least four years, matching the duration of supply contracts that some companies have signed with Samsung and SK Hynix.
Memory manufacturers have shifted production priorities toward datacenter-focused memory types like RDIMM and HBM. Consumer DDR5 production has declined as a result. A Corsair Vengeance RGB dual-channel DDR5 kit that sold for $91 dollars in July now costs a $183 dollars on Newegg. The pricing trend extends to NAND flash and hard drives. Analysts project the increases will persist for at least four years, matching the duration of supply contracts that some companies have signed with Samsung and SK Hynix.
Laptops with SOCAMM2 would be very valuable to us (Score:2)
Even Smaller than CAMM2, and slighly higher performance. And replaceable/upgradeable!
What's not to like? SOCAMM 2 is a Datacenter technology that would favourably impact us on the personal computer world. So, bring it on!
Cost of Information theory (Score:4, Interesting)
https://www.scry.llc/2025/09/1... [scry.llc]
Cost Of Information: Assume the declining cost of information (COI) has driven economic activity for fifty years. Then the stagnation or increase of COI could be disasterous for the economy. The preceding graph shows an inflection point in Internet user growth, implying that Internet growth is slowing and will soon stagnate.
I add this data point to the continuous layoffs in IT industry for several years now. we are probably at the saturation / inflection point for Information Technology.
buckle up
https://www.scry.llc/2014/05/1... [scry.llc]
Sonfoa... (Score:2)
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Re:Sonfoa... (Score:4, Interesting)
Yeah, RAM prices are crazy - I was upgrading a machine from 16GB to 64GB and the 32GB module prices I paid were insane for DDR4 - they were $200 each. And this was a few months back.
Even worse, the memory makers are not planning on altering production - the last few times memory prices shot up the bubble popped on them and they were forced to sell at a deep discount due to the excess production. So they plan on keeping production the same as they don't want to be doing the same thing again when the AI bubble pops and demand flatlines and ending up with surplus stock.
So it's even worse - the memory makers don't want to produce more because they fear it's a bubble as well as the uncertain economic situation.
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But seriously, that sounds like a pretty decent explanation. Thanks.
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Well, then I'm disappointed in Hynix. I assume Samsung isn't increasing production because they're trying to figure out how to run ads on chips. Maybe replacing m2 heat spreaders with little LCDs?
DRAM modules produced by the chip producers don't have heat spreaders. This is reserved for integrators who scrape the bottom of the bin and package garbage they don't even have the equipment to properly test in snazzy packaging to sell for a premium.
Spreaders are there to manage all of the excess heat produced by overvolting the chips because that is the only way they work at all.
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I remember paying $200 for 32K of RAM... but I guess that was a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.
When I see $200 for 32GB my reaction is "that is amazingly cheap", not that it is a rip-off. RAM prices have gone up and down from the beginning of history (i.e. the beginning of a market for RAM). Prices are very sensitive to demand and have always been so. Don't worry, they will go down and you'll probably be complaining one day that 1TB is $200 - and what a rip-off it is.
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Same. Literally saw total price estimate in my PCPartPicker list shoot up several hundred dollars in a few days.
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Same :(
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>> But what do you get out of it?
I get about 1,000 lines of working, tested code per day out of it on average.
Just in time.... (Score:2)
$ Dollars (Score:1)
"sold for $91 dollars in July now costs a $183 dollars"
If you use the dollar sign you don't need to say dollars. TFA had this correct, why change it for Slashdot?
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Because you never know, $ might be Unicode and Slashdot doesn't like Unicode ;)
(Yes, I do know better...ASCII 36... but not everybody does)
Fuc**ng AI bul**hit (Score:2)
Crypto finally stopped ruining the GPU market for gamers (mostly) and AI comes along to screw things up for consumers.
Glad I got my current PC up to 64G of RAM last year, but it's still DDR4. Guess I won't be upgrading any time soon.
compounding (Score:2)
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I wish that were true. I have a few shoe boxes full of 80s and 90s era SIPPs, SIMMs, and DIMMs that I would gladly trade for a few million. :)
Same old, same old (Score:4, Interesting)
There's always a reason for huge price swings when it comes to PC parts and peripherals. This has been true for well over 30 years now. Most of the time the price hikes are bullshit. So, many years ago, I adopted the strategy of staying a few generations behind in computing, relying mostly on the used and new old stock market to upgrade my computers when necessary. I've saved a ton of money but most importantly I avoid all of this price fixing horse shit. Hell, the computer I am typing this in on is an i7-6700K with 32GB of RAM. More than enough horsepower for at least a few more years.
Microsoft - Windows 10 - escilating the problem (Score:1)