Memory prices bothering anyone ELSE these days???

My first IBM clone had 640k of ram in it, at a cost of $99 per 256K or $400 a meg. This was 1988. I only wish I had bought 3 or 4 more of those $40 4gb ddr2-800 kits from spring of last year.
 
drescherjm said:
Hmm. I believe the 32K upgrade on the vic 20 was over $400 in 1983.
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I'd say that's about right. I bought a Timex-Sinclair zx-81 with 4k onboard for $99 or so in 1981, and a 16K memory pack for $149!
 
Memory prices (like all computer components) fluctuate all the time. Last spring was the best time I have seen to buy memory in a long time. This spring, it seems a good time to get a deal on motherboards and processors. This is one reason to buy stuff when it's a good deal, not necessarilly when you need it.

Actually, the prices on memory are still pretty good. You may have to find a rebate, or settle for a brand or speed that might not be ideal. I think the REAL problem here, is that mobos/cpus are such a good deal, it make the price of memory look worse by comparison. A good problem, for those of us that have been sitting on the RAM deal they got last year, waiting on a mobo that runs 240-pin. :)
 
I paid $97.41 shipped for this, when I bought it. I only needed 2x2GB, but it was a good deal. Now I want another 1x2GB, and it can't be had for less than $50-60. I feel the pain.
 
I bought this For $47.99 about a month ago. I checked in on it the next week and it went up almost $20 :confused:

The prices are always fluctuating. Do I think they will go back down? Of course, its only a matter of time.
 
I still think $200 for a high end 3x2gb kit is reasonable, in fact I just purchased some for that exact price(absolutely needed them). There used to be huge price hikes for the high end kits, now it only costs $30-50 more.

I knew the prices for DDR2 were unsustainable so I wasn't too shocked when prices started to climb last summer/fall. Good news is prices aren't still climbing!
 
bigchieftaco said:
I bought this For $47.99 about a month ago. I checked in on it the next week and it went up almost $20 :confused:

The prices are always fluctuating. Do I think they will go back down? Of course, its only a matter of time.
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DDR2 is not supposed to go down anymore - only up. But we shall see.
 
Lets see, My first build..way back in the day when Kyle was getting threats of lawsuits for Rat Pads. I believe I paid around a dollar a meg for PC-66 to drop into my 300a slot 1 celly hot rod (needless to say I stopped at the 128mb win 98 limit). This most recent build I dumped around $100 USD for a 8GB of used DDR2 on the forums. Parts in general have gotten nothing but cheaper, and higher quality. Sure the current prices suck compared to a year ago, but I have been doing this long enough to know how bad it really can be. And until we're back at the point where your buying minimum amounts of memory (i.e. 1gb) for top dollar (say around $100) I will just consider myself lucky to have gotten this last build done when I did.

As an unintended consequence of memory prices though has been the rising costs of USB sticks and such. Now this has been a concern of mine due to the fact I use them like crazy, and hand them out far often. I am no market genius, and know next to nothing about USB/SD cards etc but they seem to be rising in prices also. I am assuming this has to do with RAM prices somehow? Will SSD's be affected by this? Or is this a case of RAM going up due to the SSD and USB flash style of components on the market using like or same materials?
 
Sorry I started numbing myself to the pain. I like to tell myself that DDR3 is at 'normal price', which it isn't, and it makes myself feel better. I cry less?
 
These are normal. Those ultra cheap ones you are all used to are bad for business. Some places closed down because of them.

It's like when a new oil company entered my market for gas several years ago. Gas was $0.29/liter and propane was $0.09/liter. Just had to enjoy it while it lasted/
 
Just remember what DDR3 prices were like 2 and a bit years ago

all those people who bought kitting saying that they where future proofed and then I7 came out with its triple channel and 1.65v limit (suckers)

i met a guy at a LAN who spent AU $700 on 4gb of DDR3 1600mhz and he only had a C2D 6320 so he could not run it at anything above 1400mhz (or something like that)

i got my 6X 2gb for AU$248 about a year ago prices started to go down a bit and then about 4 months later it was straight up
 
Once the prices drop to $60-70 for 4gb, and $100-$110 for 6gb I will be building a new system. Until then I can't afford it. I really think many of the memory companies are trying to recoup some of there loses a few years ago when the prices were dirt cheap.
 
mmmmmdonuts said:
Once the prices drop to $60-70 for 4gb, and $100-$110 for 6gb I will be building a new system. Until then I can't afford it. I really think many of the memory companies are trying to recoup some of there loses a few years ago when the prices were dirt cheap.
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I think those prices are just about right. With mature fabs and efficient processes the stuff can't be THAT expensive to make anymore. I mean, it's 2010, after all. I hope DDR2 doesn't rise too quickly to soon either, because so many people are still using very modern and capable systems that use DDR2. If DDR2 prices go up like rumor has it, it will be bad for all of us. One of my desktops and one of my laptops use DDR3. Five of my systems use DDR2, and a really old clunker is still using DDR. Fortunately most good RAM has a lifetime warranty, so replacing sticks won't have to come out of my own pocket should they fail.
 
kencheeto said:
DDR2 market was so saturated and prices so low that at least one large memory manufacturer went out of business. That combined with the move to DDR3 makes DDR2 a dead/dying market.

I do miss the days of 35~40 for 4 gigs though. Cheap builds were so much easier in 2009.
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What the hell is all the bitching about? I remember my first stick of 64 MB mem...it was only $300 and I was happy to buy it. Heck, mem was $30/MB when I got my first PC.
 
SirKronan said:
Moore's Law! Moore's Law!!! C'mon you guys!! :p
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Moore is an idiot, a false prophet, etc... who made one educated guess and got undue credit.

Ok, now that that's out, I was really surprised how little I spent updating to my current rig it was probably the least expensive system I ever built and performs the best. All in all, just under $700 for i7 930, 6GB Corsair 1600 cl7 mem, XFX board, Corsair PSU.
My last computer build: $530 just for the CPU (AMD at that) and $200 for mem, then another $600 for video card (although I have yet to buy another card for the new system it will still be less that $600), $100 for PSU, etc...
 
BBA said:
What the hell is all the bitching about? I remember my first stick of 64 MB mem...it was only $300 and I was happy to buy it. Heck, mem was $30/MB when I got my first PC.
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Your point is? I paid $100 for two 2x2GB kits of DDR2 PC8500 last year. Now the same ram sells for around $100 a kit. DDR3 went up in price as well.
 
Hornet said:
I take it that the industry is intentionally limiting the supply to keep prices up:eek:
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No, factories have moved over to making DDR3 instead of DDR2 since DDR2 is not in demand as much, so since DDR3 is, they make more of that, thus the supply.

this happens with any new tech, the old dies off, costs go up because less is made thus they need to make more money from said product to keep production going.
 
you know they said on the news a little while back that samsung made a several million mem chip surplus but where the heck are they if they made so many
 
Sure you may pay more for ram, but your not paying as much for other parts, hard drives, power supplies are dropping again, monitors are cheap enough...

as i always say, $2k built me an awesome top of the line rig 12 years ago, and today $2k can build me an awesome rig, just back then, ram was expensive, CPU was expensive and harddrives, now it is ram, cases and powersupplies.
 
YEah, if you've got a Microcenter close, you're in CPU hog heaven right now. Seriously, $169 clearance for 920's, $200 for 930's ... ARE YOU KIDDING ME????
 
SirKronan said:
YEah, if you've got a Microcenter close, you're in CPU hog heaven right now. Seriously, $169 clearance for 920's, $200 for 930's ... ARE YOU KIDDING ME????
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"Sorry, we don't have that in stock."

RAM is pretty expensive but we do have Bing cashback, motherboards are pretty good especially with combos, processors are usually under $250 and the 5850 is around that much for a beast.
 
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231122

That used to $79.99 last year if I recall, then went up to $89.99, and now $99.99. If supply and demand is a factor, could memory manufacturers be purposely reducing the supply of DDR2 RAM to push for DDR3 to be on the market? It just seems that way right now.

A friend suggested I should just get a new board and go to DDR3 instead. Then again, 4GB DDR3 (2x 2G) is no different either. The cheapest I could see on Newegg is $93.00 from A-Data, and I have little idea on their reliability. And, looking at it, DDR3 is around $10 to $15 more than DDR2 for 4GB kits.

Really doesn't make sense at all though...

I would assume DDR2 to be MUCH cheaper than DDR3 given that the latter is relatively newer, technology-wise. However, doesn't seem to be the case. Newegg's prices are about the same as Best Buy now, which is rather sickening thought. I would have to go with price-fixing and collusion by the memory industry to drive prices up, not supply-and-demand BS.
 
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Really looking to get a Crosshair IV or the MSI 890FX board when they are released, but not really wanting to spend tons of money on quality OC'ing ram. Really sucks too. Economy shit or not, the memory manufacturers are just being stupidly greedy.
 
octoberasian said:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231122

That used to $79.99 last year if I recall, then went up to $89.99, and now $99.99. If supply and demand is a factor, could memory manufacturers be purposely reducing the supply of DDR2 RAM to push for DDR3 to be on the market? It just seems that way right now.

A friend suggested I should just get a new board and go to DDR3 instead. Then again, 4GB DDR3 (2x 2G) is no different either. The cheapest I could see on Newegg is $93.00 from A-Data, and I have little idea on their reliability. And, looking at it, DDR3 is around $10 to $15 more than DDR2 for 4GB kits.

Really doesn't make sense at all though...

I would assume DDR2 to be MUCH cheaper than DDR3 given that the latter is relatively newer, technology-wise. However, doesn't seem to be the case. Newegg's prices are about the same as Best Buy now, which is rather sickening thought. I would have to go with price-fixing and collusion by the memory industry to drive prices up, not supply-and-demand BS.
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Like anything else...buy when the buying is good or stop whining. Old memory tech always stays more expensive than new, just the way it is.

BTW: I just got 6 GB DDR3 Corsair 1600 C7 for $160 a few weeks ago, I don't think that's unreasonable yet I would have liked to have spent less on it...and that was from the egg, you just have to catch things on sale.
 
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I think it was about this time last year when Frys and ZZF kept offering 4GB Corsair and OCZ DDR2 kits for $20 after MIR. I bought 24GB of RAM just because I knew those prices couldn't stay that low forever, and if nothing else I'd always be able to unload them for at least as much as I paid. Still sitting on several kits I haven't had a use for yet but don't regret the purchases at all.

Of course I remember looking at memory upgrades for my old 8088 and deciding there was no way that was going to happen. Ah, memories...
 
white_devil said:
I think it was about this time last year when Frys and ZZF kept offering 4GB Corsair and OCZ DDR2 kits for $20 after MIR. I bought 24GB of RAM just because I knew those prices couldn't stay that low forever, and if nothing else I'd always be able to unload them for at least as much as I paid. Still sitting on several kits I haven't had a use for yet but don't regret the purchases at all.

Of course I remember looking at memory upgrades for my old 8088 and deciding there was no way that was going to happen. Ah, memories...
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I bought quite a few of those kits as well, and they've really saved me recently, or at least helped others out. I built a really cheap system to give to some friends to help their kids with school work (the youngest is home schooled, so the computer is a necessity for her.) Because of the cheap RAM, spare P4 CPU, and some other spare parts, I made them a pretty decent computer that we could afford to just give to them. Plus I just built a 4GB system for my mother in law for her home office, and a 4GB based gaming system for my 75 year old grandma that plays world of warcraft. Those builds were quite economical because of my stockpile of RAM that I bought back in those days.

I'm all out of that good cheap stuff now though. :( At least a few people benefited because of taking advantage of the sales while it lasted!
 
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