HP Says Memory's Contribution To PC Costs Just Doubled To 35%

HP has revealed that memory now accounts for 35% of the cost of materials it needs to build a PC, up from between 15 and 18% last quarter. And the company expects RAM's contribution will rise through the year. From a report: Speaking on the company's Q1 2026 earnings call, interim CEO Bruce Broussard said the company has secured long-term supply agreements for the year and also "qualified new suppliers [and] built in strategic inventory positions for key platforms and cut the time to qualify new material in half to accelerate our product configuration changes."

That sounds a lot like HP Inc is signing up new suppliers at a brisk pace. Broussard said the company has also "expanded lower-cost sourcing across our commodity basket, lowering logistics costs with agile end-to-end planning processes." The company is using its internal AI initiatives to power those new processes. The company is also "configuring our products and shaping demand to align the supply we have with our customer needs" and "taking targeted pricing actions to offset the remaining cost impact in close partnership with both our channel and direct customers."

CXMT and CHIPs

[SumDog]

It's unclear if CXMT got removed from the US sanctioned entities list, but it really needs to be. The fucking CHIPs act needs to be revoked. Billions of our tax dollars went to Micron and they turned around and fucked all consumers. I wish there was more consumer demand to run this stuff locally. Local image generation models are pretty good, but video is still a long way off and local coding models are all piss poor. I know that AI-gen video is funny and I'm gonna laugh at it, but come on man .. that perso

Re: CXMT and CHIPs

[Mr. Dollar Ton]

The reason we can't have ram is the half a trillion that the administration poured into the pockets of the AI bros so that they can corner the chip market and move us all to their "platform" and off our rigs.

Add another half from the "moat" theorists...

Things will improve for you and me only after the bubble pops .

Re:

[ArchieBunker]

Don't forget about pumping the stock prices so the suits can all receive millions in bonuses.

Re:

[Mr. Dollar Ton]

But of course, that's why the whole enterprise is in motion, wealth redistribution from the bottom to the top. But cutting us small fish from computational resource is also a goal.

Re:

[sziring]

Hold on now, the American people got something out of that deal. Won't the East Ballroom and Arch in D.C. look glorious.

Re:

[Mr. Dollar Ton]

Sure, if they ever get built... So far we've seen ruins and concepts of a plan.

Impenetrable language

[TimothyHollins]

That sounds a lot like HP Inc is signing up new suppliers at a brisk pace. Broussard said the company has also "expanded lower-cost sourcing across our commodity basket, lowering logistics costs with agile end-to-end planning processes." The company is using its internal AI initiatives to power those new processes. The company is also "configuring our products and shaping demand to align the supply we have with our customer needs" and "taking targeted pricing actions to offset the remaining cost impact in close partnership with both our channel and direct customers."

Did they also have AI generate the marketing statement?

Poetic Justice

[Locke2005]

I pray that the CEOs currently pushing AI on their companies are the first ones to have their job function completely replaced by AI... and yes, I'm required to do mandatory AI training now.

Re:

[Drethon]

That sounds a lot like HP Inc is signing up new suppliers at a brisk pace. Broussard said the company has also "expanded lower-cost sourcing across our commodity basket, lowering logistics costs with agile end-to-end planning processes." The company is using its internal AI initiatives to power those new processes. The company is also "configuring our products and shaping demand to align the supply we have with our customer needs" and "taking targeted pricing actions to offset the remaining cost impact in close partnership with both our channel and direct customers."

Did they also have AI generate the marketing statement?

I think (/s) AIs just gravitated to market speak during its training. AI has spent years training on the internet, market speak has been developed to misdirect with meaningless words for centuries.

Re:

[scumdamn]

They're buying cheaper shit, lowering the memory in products, and raising prices. They're just not willing to say it plainly.

35%?

[SlashbotAgent]

35% is a significant price hike. But, it sounds logical.

The 100% server price hikes remain unexplained. As do the 300% drive price hikes.

Re:

[evanh]

Classic marketing treatment - Charge what the market will pay. Servers are flying out the door so hiking the prices to large profit margins is only lowering the volumes a little.

The cheap end consumer UDIMM prices have quadrupled so with HP only doubling the effective pricing I guess means they are sacrificing some of the prior profits to achieve a target volume of sales. Otherwise consumers aren't buying at all.

Re:

[DarkOx]

Business are perhaps their own case but do consumers even need new PCs?

Other than AI and games what does a 10 year old box NOT do just as well as new machine. OK it compiles stuff faster, and renders video quicker if you are editing, anything else "consumers" might actually do with a PC?

PCs seem to have become like cars. The average mid market family sedan or small-suv, from 5+ years ago comfortably seats five, has a decent sound system, navigation of some variety of smart phone integration, is loaded wit

Re:

[haruchai]

a 10 yr old PC isn't getting updates so is very vulnerable to being hacked

Re:

[DarkOx]

I would not characterize a fully patched Windows 10 thru last October; as 'very vulnerable' to being hacked. At least not when third party software, specifically Chrome is still get updated thru at least 2028.

In fact in the home PC context I'd say there is probably very little real difference in posture vs that same PC running Windows 11. Yes I know Win 11 has some additional memory protection but again for home users they are not exposing native code binaries to truly untrusted inputs, with the main except

Re:

[Locke2005]

All are explained perfectly well by all computer purchasers now competing with the AI datacenter craze for hardware.

Re:

[SumDog]

Spinning hard drives have come back down. I bought 4x 30TB in December when I was afraid the prices would climb. Paid ~$2500 direct from Seagate and got 78TB of usable RAIDZ storage. By January those same drives were only available 3rd party went up to $900/each on Newegg. Now, the Seagate 32TB are available on Newegg for ~$700/each. If I had waited, I could have gotten quite a bit more storage for a little more ... but the 32TB are also sold out now, so those prices might skyrocket again.

Re:

[AnOnyxMouseCoward]

35% is the contribution of RAM to PC prices. i.e., in a $1000 PC, $350 is RAM. It used to be $150-180, that's a 100% increase.

iNcreases.

[geekmux]

35% is a significant price hike. But, it sounds logical.

How much for the logo?

Asking for the average iVictim who's been paying a 200% surcharge on (ugh, soldered) RAM options for a decade prior to the AI event horizon.

Re: 35%?

[paulatz]

If the fraction of a laptop price devoted to ram increased from 18% to 35% it did in fact MORE than double, because the hike is reflected in the final price RAM is now a higher percentage of a higher amount.

i.e. Yesterday the laptop was priced at 1000$, of which the 18%=180$ was for the RAM. Today the price is 1261$ of which 35%=441$ is for the RAM. The laptop without RAM is 820$ before and after.

Sacrifices at the altar

[HnT]

All those sacrifices at the altar of gambling on elaborate if-then-else statistics BS-generators that will surely replace us all in 12-16 monthsâ¦

Blood for the Blood God, memory chips for the bullshit generator!

Thanks, AI bubble!

[Locke2005]

You'll go down in the history books as one of the biggest causes of the fall of modern civilization.

Re:

[DarkOx]

Future text book:

In the late post war era, wealthy societies around the globe became obsessed with the idea they could create true artificial intelligence. They directed massive resources to this AI god they believed could be brought forth at a time when there need to invest these resources and wealth into addressing critical structural and sustainability issues. Hollowed out and weakened by cancerous spending, and poor energy allocation choices the great empires of the early 21st century entered a period o

Re:

[Locke2005]

Too true to be funny.