In 2020, I built a PC right before COVID hit and all the prices went sky high. This year I built a PC and… prices are going sky high (but thankfully no global pandemic yet.) The PC that I built in September was right around $1500 but now those same parts would cost me over $2500! I knew I was getting a great deal on the video card, but the real shocker is how much memory prices have increased. I paid $240 for two sticks of 32 GB DDR5-6000 memory. That same purchase now would cost $880! RAM prices started increasing almost immediately after my purchase and haven’t stopped.
Prices are climbing because the memory and storage market has been hit with a perfect storm. Manufacturers have cut back on consumer production while shifting more of their supply toward enterprise customers who are trying to meet the massive AI demand spike. At the same time, consumers started increasing demand for new parts.
It will be interesting to see how long it takes for this issue to get resolved, but I’m thankful to be writing this on a brand new machine that was bought literally days before the price increases started!