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Why have RAM prices skyrocketed?

vorpel said:
I ordered 512G of DDR4 memory (A-Tech 512GB 8x 64GB 2S2Rx4 4Rx4 PC4-21300 2666 ECC REG RDIMM Server Memory RAM) on eBay for 1 of my Proxmox servers on 10/22/2025 for $1157. I just checked and it is now going for $3200... This is insane. That with the rise in price on SSDs, going to kill the market. Of course, when the AI boom dies, there is going to be so much compute, memory and storage hit the used market, it will be a good time to upgrade. Just wish that were sooner...
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A tripling in price for ECC DDR4 actually isn’t as bad as what’s happened with DDR5

And remember that if you think you’ll have plenty of access to cheap usable computer parts if/when the AI Datacenter boom goes bust your mistaken. Storage yes, but the compute and memory that these projects use have almost no utility for personal / everyday use.

This all will end badly. Worst case scenario it causes 20% of the current financial market into a wired off. Worser case scenario is someone actually achieves AGI and 40% of the workforce is obsolete.

Fucking awful timeline.
 
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jlbenedict said:
Time to find new hobbies fellas...
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Pinball machines for me. Satisfies the electronics repair and modding need. Fun to play and collect. As long as you don't buy new it's not terrible pricewise. Trading machines is still alive and well.

You do need a lot of space though... oh, and wife approval, which I'm struggling with. She says 2 is enough.
 
I just got a rather insane combo of stuff from Newegg for what is more or less the old prices for everything. 16gb ddr5 6000, 9800x3d, itx motherboard, 240 AIO for $660.

The industry is desperate to move non memory hardware. Look for package deals.
 
jlbenedict said:
Time to find new hobbies fellas...
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I recently got a Canon R6 MK2 for a good price (my exisitng 7D and 6D were not cutting it for the photography I do) and decided to build a video rig for it so when the weather improves going to get out there and try to make some interesting video. If not well I'll try to coax the Gf into a Onlyfans...
 
daglesj said:
I recently got a Canon R6 MK2 for a good price (my exisitng 7D and 6D were not cutting it for the photography I do) and decided to build a video rig for it so when the weather improves going to get out there and try to make some interesting video. If not well I'll try to coax the Gf into a Onlyfans...
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lol

That's cool, I've been looking at that R6 mk2 as well. What kind of photography? I like wildlife and would like to try astro-night sky stuff.

To stay on topic, I just replaced some dying DDR3 on a server board from 2012 or something... pretty cheap! 32 gigs for around 100$ :LOL:
 
pendragon1 said:
the cracks are starting to appear; ms is backing off copilot, dell not pushing ai...
🤞🤞
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Because GenAI still has too many limitations, but gives the "Appearance" of being correct even when its not, so it passes the initial sniff test. Until it gets used in production and the outputs aren't checked, leading to a LOT of monetary losses. Then its scope gets reduced.

Right now, everyone is in on AI because everyone is in on AI. It's literally FOMO on the corporate level. If the big players start to back off, everyone else will as well. And the economic impact...is going to be massive.
 
I actually find co-pilot pretty useful at work to do things for me that are just boring that I do not want to do... 😂 So it saves me some time there for sure.
 
III_Slyflyer_III said:
I actually find co-pilot pretty useful at work to do things for me that are just boring that I do not want to do... 😂 So it saves me some time there for sure.
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I find its good for looking up "specific" information, but I've found instances where the information is wrong/out-of-date depending on *how* you phrase the question.

Hence the pitfalls.
 
Astral Abyss said:
Pinball machines for me. Satisfies the electronics repair and modding need. Fun to play and collect. As long as you don't buy new it's not terrible pricewise. Trading machines is still alive and well.

You do need a lot of space though... oh, and wife approval, which I'm struggling with. She says 2 is enough.
Click to expand...

Just don't look at prices from 20 years ago. If you can find a theme the wifey likes, you can get a couple more machines, though.
 
gamerk2 said:
Because GenAI still has too many limitations, but gives the "Appearance" of being correct even when its not, so it passes the initial sniff test. Until it gets used in production and the outputs aren't checked, leading to a LOT of monetary losses. Then its scope gets reduced.

Right now, everyone is in on AI because everyone is in on AI. It's literally FOMO on the corporate level. If the big players start to back off, everyone else will as well. And the economic impact...is going to be massive.
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Nvidia already has publicly backed off… and it has started to send tremors down the chain. Some people are surprised, I entirely expected it as half this forum of enthusiasts probably did.
 
gamerk2 said:
I find its good for looking up "specific" information, but I've found instances where the information is wrong/out-of-date depending on *how* you phrase the question.

Hence the pitfalls.
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I mostly use it to summarize large Scope of Work documents for me or provide some bullet points of importance. I do not need to get too technical anymore at this point in my career, just need the general idea of things.
 
I managed to get a customer a couple of 32gb 6000 cl30 kits last week for under 400 each but I don't think that's going to last much longer.

The cheap kits you can still get under $300 are 4800 cl40. I mean, just in gross general terms each 2 points of primary cas latency is worth approx 1 speed rating in perf. So that's 6 speed levels slower than cl28 AND 3-4 actual speed levels below 6000. That's some freaking slow RAM that's being pushed on everyone.
 
I knew the type of AI being pushed to the general public was all wrong.

When your advertising for it is pushed towards the lazy, untalented and feckless then you know it doesnt pass the sniff test.

I wouldnt want my staff using it.

"So you have read the report and these results have been peer reviewed Jeff? You sure? It's just that I'd like you to advise why there is a pasta sauce recipe on page 6 paragraph 4?"

Let it all burn!
 
daglesj said:
When your advertising for it is pushed towards the lazy, untalented and feckless then you know it doesnt pass the sniff test.
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I agree, but not on this point.

"No one in this world...has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people."


daglesj said:
I wouldnt want my staff using it.
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That is the correct, rational conclusion, but bosses like this are sadly scarce. Most are looking for new punishments toys to push on their workers
 
It will be interesting to see if building PCs survives going forward as it seems there is more and more pressure against it:
- crypto mining on GPU prices, now AI on RAM/storage
- powerful SoC's (I have stopped building workstations for work, Apple SoCs blow them out of the water in every way for my workloads)
- convenience - handhelds, all-in-ones for gaming like steamdecks, consumer SoCs basically
- the push to extract more revenue by locking users into unrepairable computers they don't own and charging rent.
 
Hey, I found someone locally who is selling a new (sealed) kit of 32 GB (2x16 GB) of Kingston Fury Beast RAM (CL 36) for $300 CAD. It's been a long time (many years) since I've bought any RAM and I haven't kept up with the market or brands. I currently have 16 GB of Corsair.

I'm more into stability and reliability than speed.

Is Kingston Fury Beast a good reliable brand?
 
yeah its fine, but that kit should only be $150. youll have to decide if your willing to pay double...
 
If that is DDR 5 6000 then it's cheaper than it usually is right now in USD.

In the current market that's a good price. If you can wait up to two more years it may get better... Or not.
 
Advil said:
If that is DDR 5 6000 then it's cheaper than it usually is right now in USD.

In the current market that's a good price. If you can wait up to two more years it may get better... Or not.
Click to expand...

It's DDR 5 5600. It's also already gone. Maybe it's just as well.
 
pendragon1 said:
yeah its fine, but that kit should only be $150. youll have to decide if your willing to pay double...
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Thanks. Just curious, back before the RAMpocalypse, did the price of memory used to scale with the amount of GB? In other words, was 64GB double the price of 32GB, and 32GB double the price of 16GB?
 
Peat Moss said:
Thanks. Just curious, back before the RAMpocalypse, did the price of memory used to scale with the amount of GB? In other words, was 64GB double the price of 32GB, and 32GB double the price of 16GB?
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Usually 16gb was 2/3 of 32gb, and 32gb 2/3 of 64gb but also about 60% of 48gb (which were more rare). And 96gb was roughly double 48gb and 128gb was more than double 64gb
Prices have gone up a ton but are basically where they were when ddr5 first came out. The fury kit at $300 CAD honestly isn’t bad given the current shitty market.
 
This AI crap really needs to be done with, forget the RAM crisis, they have sent stocks of bluechip software companies that have consistently beat and raised for years into the toilet over a made up narrative that vibe coding will replace all software. OpenAI needs to go bankrupt tomorrow, then the world will be sane again, we can enjoy PC gaming and walmart will stop trading at 3x mutiples of companies growing 3x as fast. If my small Nv and AMD positions half for this to happen, will be very happy. AI has made the whole market uninvestable, god forbid Anthropic release a beta plugin for somethng tomorrow and you can bet hundreds of billions will be wiped off major players in that area overnight.
 
I hope all these AI companies bankrupt ASAP
AI as technology has only negative influence on the world and now we cannot even buy PC without RAM prices being by far the highest cost.
I am basically stuck on my current rig for new few years or when RAM prices fall to reasonable levels :(
 
pendragon1 said:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVzeHTlWIDY

"With absurd RAM prices and shortages of desktop memory, we've noticed a lot of parallels between the current AI demand (or "demand") for memory and the DRAM Cartel eras of the industry."
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To me, it's the fact that all the overpriced RAM resellers on eBay aren't selling out, points to collusion. If AI were desperate for memory, they'd be buying them all no matter the cost. A fifth of a trillion dollars has been invested in AI, and $500 for 32GB of DDR5 RAM is nothing to them if they really needed it.
 
True, but if I sold them I'd certainly get more than I paid which is rare for common (undated) parts.
I have several machines running these (9950x3D) and didn't think I needed 256GB so I didn't buy more.
 
cpufrost said:
pm sent.
Also note the SSD prices too!
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Thanks, not trying to shit on you, but that was apples and oranges comparison.

This is close to spot on. $300 to $1500. Still huge suckage and general BS.

1773544394987.png
 
FrgMstr said:
Thanks, not trying to shit on you, but that was apples and oranges comparison.

This is close to spot on. $300 to $1500. Still huge suckage and general BS.

View attachment 791410
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I have been tracking it as it went up to $919, $1155, $1299 and now $3999. Have no idea why it's that high when others are selling it for half that. Typically (Microcenter) prices are in line with anyone they pricematch with the biggest competitor being Amazon. If I really needed it I'm sure they would pricematch Newegg. They've pricematched monitors that B&H had over $1k difference. I'm sure spending 6 figures annually helps.
 
cpufrost said:
I have been tracking it as it went up to $919, $1155, $1299 and now $3999. Have no idea why it's that high when others are selling it for half that. Typically (Microcenter) prices are in line with anyone they pricematch with the biggest competitor being Amazon. If I really needed it I'm sure they would pricematch Newegg. They've pricematched monitors that B&H had over $1k difference. I'm sure spending 6 figures annually helps.
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Datacenters don't seem to be buying from sellers like on eBay. I think that companies are selling at ultra high prices because datacenters potentially need them, and they don't want to risk not having stock to sell to them when another burst of datacenter purchases make the rounds. While that Crucial Pro 128GB Kit (2x64GB), either the 5600MHz or 5200MHz version is at $1,499.99 on Amazon, you have reliable sellers on eBay selling a used 2x64GB DDR5 6400MHz kit for $699.00. That's nearly half the price. You also have the same Crucial Pro 128GB DDR5 5600MHz kit selling for $991.40. Both are still available, and haven't been bought, yet.

I don't think the prices from stores will go down unless the datacenters start buying used RAM from eBay. It would mean datacenter money is drying up, and since these stores aren't getting purchases from consumers, because most consumers are going to buy used for half the price on eBay, they'll start lowering prices. There's a certain amount of time these stores will hold inventory at unsellable prices.

So, I think in the next few months, we'll see either two things:
1. Datacenters start buying from stores, and RAM is out of stock. Used RAM prices on eBays increases due to demand.
2. Datacenters start buying from reputable individual sellers. Price of RAM on eBay goes up, and price of RAM in stores go down.
 
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