A report by market analyst, TrendForce Investigations (opens in new tab) , paints a sobering picture of the state of the memory industry right now. According to the particular report, memory pricing dropped at the end of last year, forcing the likes of Micron and Kioxia to reduce the production associated with DRAM and NAND memory space. This means that the current low prices for RAM MEMORY and SSDs will be short-lived.
Micron is one of the big three suppliers of computer memory, plus alongside Samsung and SK Hynix. This oligopoly is responsible for producing 95% of the MEMORY chips that make their way into our machines. The fact that one of those is reducing production means RAM chips will be scarcer and therefore more expensive.
If Micron feels the need to decrease production, then the other two probably aren’t far behind.
The reason Micron has made the move is due to the larger consumer electronics market being weaker than expected. Add in rising inflation, the particular Russian-Ukraine war, and the continued pressure from the pandemic, and it’s bad news with regard to plenty of consumer electronics. In fact , things are so poor on the NAND flash front, that the statement suggests that some manufacturers are selling at a loss right now.
This looks like it’s going to have a knock-on effect when it comes to introducing new technologies as well. Micron is said to end up being focusing on its existing 176-layer NAND flash instead of ramping up manufacturing of its 232-layer NAND expensive (opens in new tab) as we head into the end from the year. That’s a technology that’s expected to underpin the performance of PCIe 5. 0 NVMe SSDs as well.
These brand new PCIe 5. 0 SSDs are expected to start shipping in November of this year, right now that AMD and Intel now both have supporting platforms. AMD’s Ryzen 7000 (opens within new tab) chips and Intel’s 12th (opens in fresh tab) plus 13th-Gen offerings also support DDR5, which had started to come down in price, but could today bounce back up again, making them more costly platforms in order to migrate to.
Essentially, the current incredibly low pricing regarding computer RAM MEMORY and SSDs won’t final forever, and if you’re in the market for a new system, you may have got to pull the particular trigger sooner rather compared to later. Alternatively, upgrading your current rig now may be a good idea too.