Jowi Morales Social Links Navigation Contributing Writer Jowi Morales is a tech enthusiast with years of experience working in the industry. He’s been writing with several tech publications since 2021, where he’s been interested in tech hardware and consumer electronics.
Dementoss "Don't wait"? I think not, after upgrading in May, no way whatsoever I am upgrading again soon. Sooner or later, the, as yet, apparently endless supply of money pouring in to AI, will start to dry up. Maybe then I'll think about upgrading. Reply
Notton Thankfully I can make do on RAM/SSD/HDD for a while. Though I did shelve a 6x4TB NVMe NAS build. Reply
AmirTHforum That’s a rather self‑serving suggestion. Encouraging people to buy RAM or SSDs unnecessarily only contributes to the current supply strain and drives prices even higher. A more prudent approach would be to wait as long as possible—perhaps even pausing non‑essential projects—so as not to further fuel the ongoing frenzy. Reply
CelicaGT Pffft! I'll be waiting. Perhaps forever at this rate but I refuse to be fleeced by these bloodsuckers. It's my money and if they want it they'd better make it MORE attractive not less. FOMO is for the weak. Reply
pug_s Dementoss said: "Don't wait"? I think not, after upgrading in May, no way whatsoever I am upgrading again soon. Sooner or later, the, as yet, apparently endless supply of money pouring in to AI, will start to dry up. Maybe then I'll think about upgrading. Sounds like someone wants to make the demand for ram/ssd worse. Reply
Captain Awesome I was chatting with Gemini 3 about conventional hard drives, complaining that 8 TB drives are stuck at this price. It told me manufacturers don't care about that size anymore, because they're focused on larger drives for data centers now. So I'll never get my cheap 8TB drive, but in a few years I might get a reasonably priced 30-40 TB drive. 😃 I don't care if it's hallucinating or using bad rumors in its training data, I'm holding onto this happy thought. 😁 Reply
80251 When Crucial left the consumer market does that mean they're not selling RAM at all anymore? Or just not selling RAM to consumers? If they're still going to be manufacturing RAM kits why can't consumers buy them as well? Reply
iguanac64 80251 said: When Crucial left the consumer market does that mean they're not selling RAM at all anymore? Or just not selling RAM to consumers? If they're still going to be manufacturing RAM kits why can't consumers buy them as well? They'll continue to manufacture DRAM chips, but they won't be selling it to consumers. They'll be targeting high profit customers like AI Datacenters that are heavily consuming memory supply. DRAM stick assembling companies like Corsair, G.Skill, AData, etc will get what's left over to sell to the consumer. There are only three large DRAM manufacturers (Micron (Crucial), SK Hynix, and Samsung). The only real option that might help the consumer is if the smaller Chinese DRAM manufacturers like Winbond, Nanya, and Chanxing (I think is the right name) invest in improving their facilities to crank out more memory. They're not used to competing in the higher end DRAM market that the big three play in. Reply
thestryker Storage prices have been going up for about as long as DRAM prices, but the difference is that it hasn't been a sharp rise. I think generally speaking that's due to the longevity of storage and the ability to just swap it between systems whereas if you're building a new system and say only have DDR4 you don't have a choice but to buy DDR5. I suspect the storage situation is going to be worse for longer since even if the AI bubble bursts that's not going away. The last good sales for the next couple of years on storage probably were this holiday. 80251 said: When Crucial left the consumer market does that mean they're not selling RAM at all anymore? Or just not selling RAM to consumers? If they're still going to be manufacturing RAM kits why can't consumers buy them as well? Crucial as a company will no longer exist and it was the consumer arm of Micron. Micron doesn't sell to the general market at all even though they make SSDs and various memory products. I've assumed the move to kill Crucial was more about reducing headcount and overhead than anything to do with manufacturing. Captain Awesome said: So I'll never get my cheap 8TB drive, but in a few years I might get a reasonably priced 30-40 TB drive. Consumer HDD pricing is relatively static when you look at a $/GB except on the very high capacities as they hit the market. There really isn't a good way to make HDDs cheaper and the consumer market has basically collapsed over the last decade which undoubtedly is part of it. Reply
palladin9479 It's the Fab wafer allocation limits. Each company reserves only so many wafers and process capacity and wants to maximize the profit from that and with the massive datacenter demand that means enterprise products. Enterprise products usually sell for 4~10x the price of the consumer version doesn't cost nearly that much to manufacture. In the past companies would split the capacity between the two but not with enterprise at ridiculous demand levels, executives are choosing to maximize production on the enterprise products. 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/dont-wait-if-youre-planning-to-upgrade-your-ram-or-ssd-kingston-rep-warns-says-prices-will-continue-to-go-up-nand-costs-up-246-percent#main
- https://www.tomshardware.com
- AI-designed Linux computer with 843 components boots on first attempt — dual-PCB Project Speedrun was made in just one week and required less than 40 hours of h
- New calculator helps evaluate the economics of datacenters in space — running the numbers on orbital computing reveals a brutal reality
- HDD prices spike as AI infrastructure and China's PC push collide — hard drives record biggest price increase in eight quarters, suppliers warn pressure will co
- NVIDIA Awards up to $60,000 Research Fellowships to PhD Students
- These 16 gadgets under $100 are must-haves for hobbyists and PC builders — these last-minute tech gifts are our personal picks for the tech savvy on your gift l
Informational only. No financial advice. Do your own research.