Commodity memory prices set to double as fabs pivot to AI market

Memory prices could soon be double what they were earlier this year as chipmakers switch to advanced products to target the AI market, leaving a shortfall of more mature chips such as those meeting the LPDDR4 standard. This is the warning from Counterpoint Research, which forecasts that memory prices are likely to rise 30 …

[JacobZ]

Just in time...

...for the AI bubble to pop, and the chipmakers to have to switch back again.

[Richard Tobin]

Re: Just in time...

But just think how cheap LPDDR5 memory will be when the bubble bursts!

[CountCadaver]

Re: Just in time...

Assuming they don't just follow the film industry and destroy it all and then "write it off for tax purposes"........

Or bother to lower the price Vs just shuttering facilities, laying workers off enmasse, sitting on the inventory (another tech cartel in the making?) and then use the profits for share buybacks and c suite sweetheart pay deals and bonuses...... oh wait that's what happens.....

See Nvidia when the GPU mining bubble burst....

[hoola]

Follow the money

Manufacturers will switch to the units that make the most money. That has always been newer technologies it is just the insane demand for AI is skewing this to epic proportions.

The outcome of course is that we all end up paying one way or another.

[Dave K]

AI - the gift that keeps on giving...

[IGotOut]

AI the gift that keeps on taking.

Tftfy

[frankyunderwood123]

Bloody hell!

No kidding, just checked an order I made, June 2024 - CORSAIR Vengeance DDR5 RAM 32GB (2x16GB) 6000MHz

£95 on Amazon.

Price now? £190

Super glad I don't need to buy RAM right about now.

Living a charmed life with hardware, as I managed to avoid the great GPU drought of the crypto mining era too.

I guess when the AI LLM bubble bursts, there's going to be a shit ton of really cheap RAM on the market...

[DS999]

Re: Bloody hell!

I bought in May 2025:

2x16 GB DDR4-2133 SO-DIMM $40 now $116

2x24 GB DDR5-5600 DIMM $90 now $221

I also bought 2x16 GB DDR5-6400 for $95 before I saw the special for 48 GB - its now listed at $281. If only I'd known I wouldn't have returned it!

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: Bloody hell!

May? I bought a16Gb SODIMM at the beginning of October. It's now about 2/3 more. In fact, that price increase happened within days. Same supplier's prices.

[Enough]

Re: Bloody hell!

"I guess when the AI LLM bubble bursts, there's going to be a shit ton of really cheap RAM on the market..."

The problem is it's on incompatible memory modules to the ones us 'civilians' use, so it's a resolder job.

[DS999]

Re: Bloody hell!

Nvidia is moving to use a lot more LPDDR5X in their products, as a result a lot of production is being moved from DDR5 to LPDDR5X (HBM is a quite different process so it isn't so easy to switch fabs over to that) That means if the bubble bursts there will still be DDR5 shortages for a time, but they'll end up with a surplus of LPDDR5X so if you buy products using that you might get more memory cheaper (other than maybe from Apple who has huge long term DRAM and NAND contracts so they don't get hit with the price increases everyone else is but they don't benefit if the price craters either)

[Michael Strorm]

Re: Bloody hell!

Price more than doubling in 18 months? Try five weeks!

I ordered a pair of Corsair DDR5 RAM modules (2 x 16GB) from Scan on the 12th of October *this* year for £109.99 and the price for the *exact* same SKU had already jumped to £173.99 by 12 November, i.e. exactly a month later.

I checked earlier this week and in just five days the price had jumped *again* to £233.99...!!