PS5 now costs less than 64GB of DDR5 memory. RAM jumps to $600 due to shortage
31 comments
·November 24, 2025timschmidt
wkat4242
Well, what really prompted this crisis is AI, as well as Samsung shutting down some production (and I have to say I don't think they mind that the pricing has skyrocketed as a result!)
But yes we're going to need more fabs for sure
pseudosavant
Built my son's first gaming PC 2 months ago. Figured it would be cheaper around Black Friday, but the prices were reasonable enough that we didn't wait. Turned out to be a huge savings to buy that fast DDR5 in September.
EddieB
Just went through this today for my daughter- struggled to find an i5 not on pre-order, and the RAM was crippling- ended up going Ryzen 7 for a first time and 2x8Gb DDR5 6000 @ £119 - looking forward to building it with her!
theginger
When did a PS5 become a unit of cost? For reference seems to be about 0.002 London buses
jkingsman
I think it's intended as a comparison of cost when building a gaming-capable computer vs. a console of somewhat equivalent power.
silisili
Seems like an American thing. We measure distances in football fields and volumes in olympic pools, seems we now measure money in PS5s. It tracks...
Yokolos
Give it a month or two and it might be cheaper to get the bus.
radicality
I just checked how much I paid around 12 months ago for Crucial 96GB kit (2x48GB ddr5 5600 so-dimm). Was $224, same kit today I see listed at $592, wild :/
Someone1234
It will be interesting to see the knock on effect of some upcoming consumer electronics; for example Apple was rumored to be working on a cheaper MacBook that uses an iPad CPU, and Valve is working on a SteamOS based gaming machine. Both will likely live/die based on price.
dsiddharth
helps that Apple's SoC has the RAM on the main die itself. They're probably immune from these price hikes, but a lot of the PC/Windows vendors would, which would only make Apple's position even stronger
arjie
How does that make a difference? It's not like the price change is on DIMMs. The price change is on the DRAM, which is a commodity item. It's not like someone is going to discount it if you tell them "nah, I'm going to solder this one to my SoC".
If Apple is insulated it is likely because Apple signs big contracts for large supply and manufacturers would prefer to be insulated from short-term demand shocks and have some reliability that their fabs can keep running and producing profitable chips.
bryanlarsen
They're probably immune for a while because they're probably using a long term contract, but when it comes time to renew they'll have to offer close to market price to convince the manufacturers not to use that fab space for more profitable memory.
201984
Which Apple product is this? Memory dies and logic dies require entirely different factories to make, so I doubt this SoC exists.
dawnerd
Noticed SSDs went up too. There's a "black friday" sales price for a 4TB crucial external drive that's at its highest price in 90 days.
Bad time if you need to build a computer.
rkagerer
Article says:
Looking at it optimistically, you're probably going to find DDR5 at bargain prices again in 2027.
When do you think prices will recede again?
StopDisinfo910
RAM prices are cyclical. We are in the under supply part of the cycle.
People just have to wait. As prices are sky high, production capacity will likely increase. Some AI companies will go bust. Demand will plummet and we will buy RAM for pennies while the market consolidates.
schmidtleonard
Sam Altman is such a bastard.
forgetfulness
He’ll have pissed off a lot of very rich and powerful people once they’re forced to accept that they’ll still need us plebes in the end, does he have an exit plan?
koakuma-chan
Did Sam Altman buy out all gaming RAM?
rtkwe
LLM models are voracious consumers of RAM for the top full power models so yes, not directly but they're all consuming massive amounts of the production capacity of memory makers it's impacting the 'gaming RAM' market too. They're not separate markets just because the end use is slightly different.
John23832
OpenAI bought 40% of all wafers. So yes.
schmidtleonard
If a Bond villain bought all of the oil in the Middle East, would it affect prices in the US? (Yes, of course it would.)
wkat4242
No, but the factory capacity and raw materials needed to make that gaming dram is now under higher demand to make stuff like gddrx and hbm.
lousken
Everyone should unsub from this AI frenzy, this is ridiculous
StableAlkyne
It's crazy how much RAM has inflated in the last month. I checked the price history of a few DDR5 kits and most have tripled since September.
geerlingguy
Ouch. Wondering if homelabs will be scavenged for unused RAM as even DDR4 is going up in price :(
Yokolos
I bought 32GB of DDR5 SODIMM last year for 108€ on Amazon. The exact same product that I bought back then is now 232€ on Amazon. I don't like this ride.
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HacklesRaised
AI is a net negative fnyor anyone not in on the grift.
Potentially unpopular take: memory manufacturers have been operating on the margins of profitability for quite a while now. Their products are essentially an indistinguishable commodity. Memory from Samsung or Micron or another manufacturer may have slight differences in overclockability, but that matters little to folks who just want a stable system. Hopefully the shortage leads large purchasers to engage in long-term contracts with the memory manufacturers which give them the confidence to invest in new fabs and increased capacity. That would be great for everyone. Additionally, we're likely to see Chinese fab'd DRAM now, which they've been attempting since the '70s but never been competitive at. With these margins, any new manufacturer could gain a foothold.
If LLMs' utility continues to scale with size (which seems likely as we begin training embodied AI on a massive influx of robotic sensor data) then it will continue to gobble up memory for the near future. We may need both increased production capacity _and_ a period of more efficient software development techniques as was the case when a new 512kb upgrade cost $1,000.