Have DDR2 prices peaked?

bremen1874 · 3 Feb 2010 at 04:34

The last memory I purchased was a 2x2GB DDR2 OCZ Platinum kit. This was about 12 months ago and cost roughly £40 (inc. delivery and Vat).

I’m now in the market for some additional memory and things have obviously changed a bit since then! I was after 4x2GB which at the current prices I can’t easily justify.

Does anyone know if memory prices are currently falling/stable/rising?

hp7909 · 3 Feb 2010 at 04:53

Demand/availability must be going down consequently the price goes the other way.

bremen1874 · 3 Feb 2010 at 05:03

I appreciate that it’s going to be a supply/demand situation that’s effecting prices. It's also fairly obvious that it's not just a simple matter of DDR3 superseding DDR2.

As I haven’t had any reason to monitor memory prices over the last 12 months I’m not in a position to know whether prices are currently ‘falling/stable/rising’.

I was hoping that someone who purchases memory on a more regular basis would be able to offer some insight.

Solaris · 3 Feb 2010 at 05:16

Currently rising for DDR2, currently falling for DDR3...

After memory is replaced by a newer model, prices will rise and rise.

You should see the prices...

1GB DDR3 = £23.49 Falling
1GB DDR2 = £32.89 Rising
1GB DDR = £41.11 Rising
1GB SDRAM = £169.19 Rising

From a popular memory manufacturer....

hp7909 · 3 Feb 2010 at 07:44

Solaris said:
currently falling for DDR3...

Thanks to increased usage/demand i.e. new & readily available mobos/PCs/laptops/etc that use it.

The supply & demand argument is plausible if you take above into account. Also bear in mind (from what I understand) a newer RAM spec = cheaper to make or rather cheaper parts.

eddiew · 3 Feb 2010 at 08:32

hp7909 said:
The supply & demand argument is plausible if you take above into account. Also bear in mind (from what I understand) a newer RAM spec = cheaper to make or rather cheaper parts.

It's worth noting (with regard to DDR3) that a few articles have pointed out that sale price is running below manufacturing cost, and that back stocks of memory chips are strained due to production being scaled back during the world recession. Coupled with (predicted) increased demand for new PCs due to Windows 7, there's a lot of people suggesting prices will continue rising for the next year

E.g...

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/pc-prices-increase-expensive-cost,9434.html

http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2010/01/pc-prices-may-rise-reversing-six-year-trend.ars

http://geeksinformed.blogspot.com/2009/02/current-price-trends-for-computer-parts.html

bremen1874 · 4 Feb 2010 at 00:54

Thanks for the input.

I think I'm going to have to wait a see which way prices go over the next couple of weeks.

The machine currently has 2x1GB of Unbuffered ECC DDR2 installed (Dell Precision T3400). I was planning on replacing it with 4x2GB of Non-ECC but current pricing has spoilt that plan.

I'm now planning on keeping the existing memory and limiting the machine to 6GB. Unfortunately this means I'm going to need matching ECC memory.

It does however look like things have improved slightly over the last few weeks. The current cost for a 2x2GB ECC kit from Crucial is £90.46. Google has a cached version of Crucial’s page from 09/01/2010 where they were charging £103.39.

tundra · 4 Feb 2010 at 02:32

yeah it's quite annoying but i guess most manufacturers have shifted production to ddr3

bremen1874 · 4 Feb 2010 at 09:57

The excessive DDR2 pricing wouldn't be so bad if the DDR3 pricing had dropped to compensate.

If I could get even basic DDR3 at/near the prices I was paying for DDR2 12 months ago I'd just cut my losses and get a DDR3 platform. As things stand memory for the Dell Precision T3500 (ECC DDR3) costs even more than the DDR2 I need for my Precision T3400.

I deal with specing quite a few Dell desktop PCs for offices. Six months ago 4GB was the normal base memory, that's now dropped back to 2GB on most machines.

arknor · 4 Feb 2010 at 10:00

eddiew said:
It's worth noting (with regard to DDR3) that a few articles have pointed out that sale price is running below manufacturing cost, and that back stocks of memory chips are strained due to production being scaled back during the world recession. Coupled with (predicted) increased demand for new PCs due to Windows 7, there's a lot of people suggesting prices will continue rising for the next year

E.g...

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/pc-prices-increase-expensive-cost,9434.html

http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2010/01/pc-prices-may-rise-reversing-six-year-trend.ars

http://geeksinformed.blogspot.com/2009/02/current-price-trends-for-computer-parts.html

lies its all due to the memory alliance a bunch of manufactures made they are basicly manipulating the memory market because between them they control over 50% of the memory plants

Ricardox1 · 4 Feb 2010 at 14:52

I'd say all ram prices are peaking right now.

VortX · 6 Feb 2010 at 11:06

Just been doing some reading up on memory prices, apparently DRAM manufactures dropped prices in December/January, however this lead to a drop in profits – they have been making steady profit increases for about the past 6 months. Maybe because the retailers didn't pass those price drops on? Anyway, they are switching to 50nm and expect production to kick off in Q2 of 2010. Therefore you will see a price drop sometime after Q2 for DDR3. However DDR2 prices will probably go up as it is being phased out, thus there is high demand for low production.

Minstadave · 6 Feb 2010 at 16:56

DDR2 isn't going to get any cheaper, exactly the same happened with DDR1. It has become a niche product and production is only going to fall.

Nemesis379 · 6 Feb 2010 at 18:07

man i remember when ddr2 was like £40 for 2x2gb 800mhz now its like £70 + Non branded..

Minstadave · 6 Feb 2010 at 18:31

Yeah I picked up 8gigs of Kingston Hyperx PC8500 for £70

COYS · 6 Feb 2010 at 18:38

Still kicking myself for not grabbing another 4 gb when it was at its lowest

Hairybudda · 6 Feb 2010 at 18:47

I got 8gb or OCZ Gold PC8500 for something silly like £70.00 about this time last year, think i hit the sweet spot perfectly.

1337z0r · 6 Feb 2010 at 19:04

Got my self 8GB Kingston HyperX PC8500 for £80 in September last year just before prices started rising

.

scotty365 · 7 Feb 2010 at 00:00

eddiew said:
It's worth noting (with regard to DDR3) that a few articles have pointed out that sale price is running below manufacturing cost, and that back stocks of memory chips are strained due to production being scaled back during the world recession. Coupled with (predicted) increased demand for new PCs due to Windows 7, there's a lot of people suggesting prices will continue rising for the next year

E.g...

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/pc-prices-increase-expensive-cost,9434.html

http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2010/01/pc-prices-may-rise-reversing-six-year-trend.ars

http://geeksinformed.blogspot.com/2009/02/current-price-trends-for-computer-parts.html

Good argument.

I believe that the 'massive drop in prices' of last year is a better way of explaining the current pricing; it was a massive drop and not something that will happen again and not something to be hoped for. Waiting to buy something while the market drops to last years prices it futile, it simply WILL NOT HAPPEN.

VortX · 7 Feb 2010 at 01:23

scotty365 said:
Good argument.

I believe that the 'massive drop in prices' of last year is a better way of explaining the current pricing; it was a massive drop and not something that will happen again and not something to be hoped for. Waiting to buy something while the market drops to last years prices it futile, it simply WILL NOT HAPPEN.

I fail to see how they are loosing money though, maybe I am wrong, but the memory companies are building brand spanking new R&D as well as production facilities, they are employing a shed load more staff, and switching over to lower nm production. If they have been "suffering" so badly then where the hell did they get the money from? lol Exaplain that one chaps lol