The NeoX DDR5-6000 CL26 kit, for example, has jumped up $50 to $1,150 — yes, that's for a 2 x 16 GB kit still — while the CL28 kit has jumped up to $1,030 (a $30 price increase). Two weeks ago, we saw non-ULL kits selling at $560 and $700 for CL28 and CL26, respectively, creating a large delta in price between ULL and non-ULL kits. Now, those kits are selling for $700 and $900, respectively.
The introduction of ULL couldn't have come at a worse time, as the ongoing DRAM shortage continues to raise the cost of building a PC around the world. Adding a premium on top of those already inflated prices is tough to justify, even if that premium is modest — especially for mainstream CL36 and CL30 kits, the "ULL tax" is essentially null. The good news is that you can largely achieve what ULL offers on your own, at least given that you have the patience to sit through tuning your memory for single-digit gains.
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Jake Roach is the Senior CPU Analyst at Tom\u2019s Hardware, writing reviews, news, and features about the latest consumer and workstation processors. ","collapsible":{"enabled":true,"maxHeight":250,"readMoreText":"Read more","readLessText":"Read less"}}), "https://slice.vanilla.futurecdn.net/13-4-25/js/authorBio.js"); } else { console.error('%c FTE ','background: #9306F9; color: #ffffff','no lazy slice hydration function available'); } Jake Roach Social Links Navigation Senior Analyst, CPUs Jake Roach is the Senior CPU Analyst at Tom’s Hardware, writing reviews, news, and features about the latest consumer and workstation processors.
TechieTwo Buying premo priced DRAM that provides no tangible system improvement is for the technically challenged who have failed to educate themselves. Reply
Zaranthos It's just premature to buy ULL now because the real benefits don't come until you pair it with a next generation AMD processor and ULL CUDIMM kit. The real benefits don't come until the next gen memory controller can fully take advantage of both CUDIMM and ULL. The performance difference will be night and day. Currently with ULL you're likely to get 6000 – 6400 MT/s at best and still maintain a 1:1 ratio. With CUDIMM ULL and the next generation AMD CPU's you can maintain a 1:1 ratio and push 7200 – 8000+ MT/s while still hitting lower ULL latency settings. We're talking about going from 52ns to 45ns while at the same time increasing memory bandwidth by nearly 2000 MT/s with no 1:2 ratio penalty. When you have a next gen AMD chip, CUDIMM ULL kit and ULL the numbers will look completely different. You'll still be paying a fortune for RAM, unless supply catches up with demand, but you won't be talking about a meager 4% performance gain, you'll be getting some serious performance gains across the board. Unfortunately CUDIMM + supply shortage = even more expensive memory kits. Hopefully fab expansion projects get completed ahead of schedule or yields are better than expected to relieve the supply pressure of AI expansion, but I'm not holding my breath. Reply
VizzieTheViz Zaranthos said: It's just premature to buy ULL now because the real benefits don't come until you pair it with a next generation AMD processor and ULL CUDIMM kit. The real benefits don't come until the next gen memory controller can fully take advantage of both CUDIMM and ULL. The performance difference will be night and day. Currently with ULL you're likely to get 6000 – 6400 MT/s at best and still maintain a 1:1 ratio. With CUDIMM ULL and the next generation AMD CPU's you can maintain a 1:1 ratio and push 7200 – 8000+ MT/s while still hitting lower ULL latency settings. We're talking about going from 52ns to 45ns while at the same time increasing memory bandwidth by nearly 2000 MT/s with no 1:2 ratio penalty. When you have a next gen AMD chip, CUDIMM ULL kit and ULL the numbers will look completely different. You'll still be paying a fortune for RAM, unless supply catches up with demand, but you won't be talking about a meager 4% performance gain, you'll be getting some serious performance gains across the board. Unfortunately CUDIMM + supply shortage = even more expensive memory kits. Hopefully fab expansion projects get completed ahead of schedule or yields are better than expected to relieve the supply pressure of AI expansion, but I'm not holding my breath. I don’t doubt the numbers will be better on zen 6 with cudimms but expensive memory almost never makes an actual noticeable difference unless you have an extremely specific workload to take advantage of it. You can probably *measure* it in gaming, but you’ll never actually notice it while playing a game. The only place you’ll really notice it is in your bank account. For gaming just get enough reasonably fast memory and call it a day. Reply
blitzkrieg316 RAM speed is moot for most. The difference is a few percent in any generation. It's not like going from single to dual channel… Especially when a 3% increase double the cost… Reply
HyperMatrix VizzieTheViz said: I don’t doubt the numbers will be better on zen 6 with cudimms but expensive memory almost never makes an actual noticeable difference unless you have an extremely specific workload to take advantage of it. You can probably *measure* it in gaming, but you’ll never actually notice it while playing a game. The only place you’ll really notice it is in your bank account. For gaming just get enough reasonably fast memory and call it a day. If we swap “expensive” for well-tuned, then yes there is a measurable impact in performance. Especially for 1% lows and frame time stability. I’m running 6300 cl24 myself. But it does take days of tuning and testing. If the ULL kits get you almost to that level without needing any experience/time, then it’s probably worth paying to avoid the hassle of it all. Especially if you’re someone who is already paying $4-$5K for a GPU. Best way to describe might be this. Normal ram is your air cooled GPU. Tuned memory is a custom loop/GPU block. ULL is a AIO water cooled GPU. For someone who doesn’t want to do a custom loop…it can provide a decent bump. Reply
Zaranthos VizzieTheViz said: I don’t doubt the numbers will be better on zen 6 with cudimms but expensive memory almost never makes an actual noticeable difference unless you have an extremely specific workload to take advantage of it. You can probably *measure* it in gaming, but you’ll never actually notice it while playing a game. The only place you’ll really notice it is in your bank account. For gaming just get enough reasonably fast memory and call it a day. Well I went for a little better deal on RAM and much later when a BIOS update enabled my RAM to automatically run a better speeds I did notice the difference in real world use. I don't chase the bleeding edge performance or overclock but I do appreciate speed and notice the difference. My biggest complaint would be that Windows has gotten too bloated and requires more hardware to feel snappy. Reply
thestryker In normal times ULL isn't realistically going to carry any price increase over memory that would have the same primary timings. We're not in normal times though and this memory uses newer IC which means it cost more to acquire so that's getting passed onto the buyer. I wouldn't be surprised if in the next 6-12mo DRAM prices have equalized, but unfortunately my assumption is that most will go up to what these cost as opposed to them coming down. Reply
Pierce2623 This is why you buy the cheapest ddr5 kit you can find with Hynix chips snd tune it yourself….. Reply
SkyBill40 New kit doesn't quite measure up to promises made by the manufacturer while RAM continues to be absurdly priced and akin to market manipulation. More news at 11. Reply
Key considerations
- Investor positioning can change fast
- Volatility remains possible near catalysts
- Macro rates and liquidity can dominate flows
Reference reading
- https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/ram/SPONSORED_LINK_URL
- https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/ram/amd-expo-ull-shows-middling-performance-gains-in-initial-tests-despite-price-increase-first-benchmarks-show-up-to-a-4-percent-improvement-with-ddr5-6000-cl36#main
- https://www.tomshardware.com/subscription
- Nanya to quadruple capital spending to $6.2 billion in 2027 as DRAM prices push gross margin to 79.5% — Q2 revenue skyrockets as ASPs for memory continue to sur
- AMD EXPO ULL shows middling performance gains in initial tests despite eye-watering price increase — first benchmarks show up to a 4% improvement with DDR5-6000
- Sega’s $5M investment saved Nvidia in 1996, now Jensen Huang is heading to Tokyo to mark 30 years of partnership — Akihabara event will include a GeForce RTX 50
- NVIDIA and Hugging Face Bring New Models and Frameworks to LeRobot for the Open Robotics Community
- Rapidus fab roadmap examined — first new leading-edge chipmaker in decades has one Hokkaido fab, a 2027 deadline, and 60 potential customers
Informational only. No financial advice. Do your own research.