Memory prices going up!

HangTime · 23 Jan 2017 at 07:59

Memory has always been very volatile and I think a say a year ago it was arguably a bit 'too cheap' in that you could buy more than you needed for well under £100. Over the years prices have fluctuated but generally I would say the amount for a standard enthusiast build has typically been priced around £75-150, sometimes higher during a shortage, sometimes lower during a glut but that is the sort of equilibrium level if you like.

Memory manufacturers are also notorious for price-fixing so I expect they take action when margins are getting too low.

They are also quite susceptible to manufacturing issues caused by natural disasters and the like which can disrupt the supply chain.

Silent_Scone · 23 Jan 2017 at 08:47

HangTime said:
Memory has always been very volatile

I see what you did there, boss.

FrozenShivers · 23 Jan 2017 at 22:15

Just had a look and memory does seem pretty expensive at the moment, although going from memory it's one of the more volatile PC components price wise I think? It's always seemed to fluctuate a lot.

Combat Fighter · 25 Jan 2017 at 13:56

Just checked the price of the memory kit I bought last year.

Wow prices have gone up!

Glad I bought when I did. LOL

CEUOTC · 25 Jan 2017 at 21:57

398 quid is what it would cost me now for my 64gb! Glad l got it when I did.

Gibbo · 1 Feb 2017 at 17:54

Doogles said:
Have you ever thought about taking some risk and buying some real cheap and just sticking it at the back of the warehouse?

Yes I do this often, the deals we did on Avexir RAM recently arrived in our warehouse over six months ago, we then just keep it off sale and then put it on sale, undercut the market and make good margin.

Prices are still increasing, 32GB kits are now closing onto £300, its getting crazy as is SSD pricing too.

holdin09 · 3 Feb 2017 at 17:06

Last May I bought 1 x 8GB memory stick for £25.99, if I was to buy it today it would be £51.99 lol.

tom01 · 5 Feb 2017 at 06:23

Gibbo said:
Yes I do this often, the deals we did on Avexir RAM recently arrived in our warehouse over six months ago, we then just keep it off sale and then put it on sale, undercut the market and make good margin.

Prices are still increasing, 32GB kits are now closing onto £300, its getting crazy as is SSD pricing too.

Gibbo, any ideas from your crystal ball if this is likely to be for the foreseeable future or will prices stabilise and even drop again do you think? I ask as I'm due my first upgrade for a few years soon and am quite concerned having seen the RAM and storage prices as late. :eek:

It's like when the tsunami wiped out HDD production all over again!

Yutang13 · 5 Feb 2017 at 08:55

tom01 said:
Gibbo, any ideas from your crystal ball if this is likely to be for the foreseeable future or will prices stabilise and even drop again do you think? I ask as I'm due my first upgrade for a few years soon and am quite concerned having seen the RAM and storage prices as late. It's like when the tsunami wiped out HDD production all over again!

This is in no way fact just a rumour I've heard:
Start of 2018 might be when supply catches up. Not soon at any rate. It's crazy, I bought my 1x8gb of ram back when skylake first came out and now the price is even more than it was back then.
Same with SSDs I was watching for a good deal and saw the prices become about £50 for a 240gb more and more often and then it started going backwards!

No more NAND for me then

chongker · 6 Feb 2017 at 05:55

Man, between the NAND shortages driving SSD prices up, and inflated RAM prices, it's not the greatest time to be making a new build.

I guess in my mind it does make some sense that supply would be tighter now than it was last year, even if supply remained constant. There have been a lot more devices announced in the last year or so that use DDR4 (e.g. all the mainstream Skylake laptops), so demand from sources other than end users of RAM sticks would have increased exponentially (hence maybe part of the reason Apple stuck with LPDDR3 this year?)

Hotwired · 6 Feb 2017 at 06:56

Doogles said:
Have you ever thought about taking some risk and buying some real cheap and just sticking it at the back of the warehouse?

You can only be sure something is low in hindsight.

Sargatanas2511 · 15 Feb 2017 at 08:56

Gibbo said:
Yes I do this often, the deals we did on Avexir RAM recently arrived in our warehouse over six months ago, we then just keep it off sale and then put it on sale, undercut the market and make good margin.

Prices are still increasing, 32GB kits are now closing onto £300, its getting crazy as is SSD pricing too.

So there's no sign in the near future of this trend changing?

DrunkRufie · 16 Feb 2017 at 14:08

Global DRAM revenue jumps 18.2% in Q4 2016, contract prices to increase by 40% in Q1 2017 http://press.trendforce.com/node/view/2753.html

Psycho Sonny · 16 Feb 2017 at 14:17

Sargatanas2511 said:
So there's no sign in the near future of this trend changing?

If you need RAM buy it. If you don't then don't. Simple as that really.

You can also buy second hand if new is too pricey.

Sargatanas2511 · 16 Feb 2017 at 17:04

Psycho Sonny said:
If you need RAM buy it. If you don't then don't. Simple as that really.

You can also buy second hand if new is too pricey.

I am asking mainly because I intend to build two systems around May/June time and was wondering if there was any expectation of a price increase or drop.

AiiR · 16 Feb 2017 at 23:13

My 16GB kit was just over 50 quid last year, now you're hard pushed to find 16GB under £100, mental.

Psycho Sonny · 17 Feb 2017 at 09:54

Sargatanas2511 said:
I am asking mainly because I intend to build two systems around May/June time and was wondering if there was any expectation of a price increase or drop.

If anyone knew the answer to that we would all be millionaires.

it's basically asking do you know if the pound will strengthen against the dollar by May/June or weaken further.

People can make predictions however none of them can do it with 100% certainty.

My prediction? Prices won't change that much. If they go up or down it will be by very little. So why bother investing money now and be without it for 4 months?

What you could do is keep an eye out for cheap second hand RAM over the next 4 months and if a deal comes up that is say 25% below the going rate for second hand RAM then buy it.

Sargatanas2511 · 17 Feb 2017 at 12:39

I understand what you mean but all I was hoping for was something along the lines of "it doesn't look like it will change any time soon" or "Samsung have announced increased production so it should start to come down later in the year".

But yes thanks for your input and I think I may well do that. I never really considered second hand RAM because of the fact I will be building two systems (probably identical).

daman2k · 23 Feb 2017 at 22:22

The prices are crazy and no doubt when ryzen releases it's only going to get worse.

Crockett · 26 Feb 2017 at 08:45

Only a small part of increases are due to Brexit and most of it due to Nand shortages. This is an interesting read that suggests RAM and SSD prices will probably keep increasing till middle of this year and not come down till either end of 2017 or early 2018 http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/ssd-hdd-shortage-nand-market,news-54328.html It really sucks as looking to upgrade in summer and need both RAM and an SSD!