this post was submitted on 12 Jan 2026
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What I heard on the ground floor from various system integrators, components manufacturers, and other companies, is memory supply has been tied up for all of 2026, and that shortages could last as long as until 2031.

Sure it's scuttlebutt but wouldn't surprise me as being true.

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[–] cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca 3 points 2 hours ago

Game developers should focus on making good fun games without pushing the envelope on graphics, or maybe work more on optimizing things.

Microsoft should focus on not making windows a bloated piece of shit that consumes so much memory.

[–] chunes@lemmy.world 8 points 10 hours ago (4 children)

eli5 why doesn't someone produce ram and refuse to sell to AI companies and make a bloody fortune?

[–] shirro@aussie.zone 6 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago)

AI investment isn't rational like consumer spending. Consumers will only spend what is reasonable for their needs.

The AI bubble allows companies to purchase inventory at higher prices than consumers will ever pay then leave it on a shelf unused. The suppliers are making record profits supplying them. Unless China increases supply beyond the current memory cartel all we can do is wait for the inevitable market collapse.

[–] mholiv@lemmy.world 22 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago)

Because the AI companies will just offer to buy at a higher price.

If you refuse to sell to AI companies you will make a small fortune yes. If you sell to the highest bidder you’ll make a larger fortune.

[–] ThomasWilliams@lemmy.world 3 points 8 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago)

If there was really any demand more DRAM would be being produced.

The reality is most datacentre companies have warehouses full of DRAM and GPUs waiting for datacentres to be built. By the time they will be built, the GPUs they have stashed will be obsolete.

PC sales - and PCs use a lot more DRAM than phones - are falling off a cliff.

So there is no real future demand, that's why no ones building chip fabs.

[–] Coleslaw4145@lemmy.world 4 points 10 hours ago

Samsung

SK Hynix

Micron

That's why.

Developing DRAM manufacturing capability is insanely difficult and hugely expensive. Almost all the worlds DRAM comes from one of these three names and they're already making their fortune selling to AI companies. They don't care about how many penny's people like you or me can scrape together.

[–] HugeNerd@lemmy.ca 3 points 8 hours ago

Penis! I picked a fine time to finally want to upgrade my Win 7 laptop from 2011.

[–] MehBlah@lemmy.world 3 points 8 hours ago

When the bubble pops most of that gear will be useless for consumer use.

[–] commander@lemmy.world 1 points 7 hours ago

I'm betting on a $700/$800 Steam Deck 2 when that launches and that being a solid deal. PS6 and it's rumored 36GB of memory, don't hold your breath for a release

[–] Cevilia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 106 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago) (1 children)

To spell this out clearly, the reason RAM has quadrupled in price is that a huge quantity of RAM that hasn't been produced yet has been bought with money that doesn't exist to populate GPUs that also haven't been produced to go in datacenters that haven't been built powered by infrastructure that may never exist to meet a demand that doesn't exist at all to make profit margins that mathematically can't exist while economists talk about this thing they call the "rational markets hypothesis".

(source)

[–] YesButActuallyMaybe@lemmy.ca 14 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

This meme is pretty new, like from the future, but it checks out.

[–] orbitz@lemmy.ca 2 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

Okay I'm old is this a actually newer meme or was it a joke to post the reply?

It does sound familiar (like close to a movie line) but also sounds accurate. If the bubble pops so much memory available cheaper.

Mean I'm only 1 year into my PC build but I tend to do them every 4 years or so......crap that's only 5 years from now I thought it was longer, but still lot closer than I thought from first read. Least at this age time goes by quickly, for better or worse heh.

[–] Zamboni_Driver@lemmy.ca 5 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

It's not an original comment.

[–] Cevilia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago) (1 children)

I thought everyone had heard this meme by now.

I edited my post to add the source.

[–] Zamboni_Driver@lemmy.ca 2 points 3 hours ago

Sorry I didn't mean anything by that. I don't care if you post a source or not. I was just answering their question.

[–] Pavidus@lemmy.world 58 points 1 day ago (2 children)

The solution is surprisingly simple:

"Sorry, I can't use your online services. My electronics died. Oh well." 🤷‍♂️

[–] matlag@sh.itjust.works 6 points 10 hours ago

"No worries! We just launched Chat-Phone: a cellphone totally connected to ChatGPT. It has almost no capability by itself: poor CPU, min RAM, min/no storage, etc. But it is always connected to ChatGPT!
BTW: because of RAM shortage, we are the only smartphone maker in the world now!"
The phone is 50$, but you need the premium subscription for it to work…

[–] AlecSadler@lemmy.dbzer0.com 20 points 1 day ago (2 children)
[–] Taleya@aussie.zone 2 points 10 hours ago

The fashionable new sport

[–] notso@feddit.org 14 points 1 day ago

So be it, then... We ride at dawn.

[–] Sanctus@anarchist.nexus 115 points 1 day ago (2 children)

This cyber enron circlejerk wont last that long

[–] LodeMike@lemmy.today 85 points 1 day ago (2 children)

The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.

[–] Jhex@lemmy.world 2 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

this is not "the market" that phrase is referring to

[–] LodeMike@lemmy.today 1 points 7 hours ago

What market is it?

[–] Sanctus@anarchist.nexus 27 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Oh no, I saw this coming and bought RAM at the first hike. I'm good for 8 more years. This doesnt help everyone else tho.

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[–] Trainguyrom@reddthat.com 65 points 1 day ago (1 children)

A 5 year DRAM shortage is pretty hard to imagine. I have to suspect that's a projection that assumes no AI bubble popping (which given how insanely over-leveraged basically every company involved in the bubble is, its inevitable. They're literally spending more building these datacenters than they can ever dream of recouping once built!) The last DRAM shortage (around 2017-2019 by memory) was only really bad for about a year or so, getting gradually better until it became an absolute glut of DRAM supply that lasted until...well about 3 months ago. $60 per terabyte of SSD storage was glorious, and hopefully I can afford to benefit from the next DRAM glut in 2-5 years

[–] foodvacuum@lemmy.world 33 points 1 day ago (1 children)

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/doj-launches-criminal-investigation-fed-chair-jerome-powell/story?id=129114228

Saw this in the news. They're trying really hard to stack the federal reserve board and send interest rates back down to financial crisis/pandemic levels. AI bubble can have some leg room if interest rates tank

[–] Trainguyrom@reddthat.com 15 points 1 day ago

Honestly interest rates dropping might be ultimately be a good thing. The job market is so tight and most recession indicators have already been blazing. I doubt they'll do the same hard drop they did in Q2 of 2020, but I do think more aggressive rate cuts might alleviate a lot of the burden consumers (especially young adults and anyone unfortunate enough to have been/be jobless over the last couple of years) have been feeling. A big chunk of the inflation consumers were seeing on goods in 2024 was just companies making opportunistic price increases, as evidenced by the heavily advertised price drops afterwards.

Additionally there is the statistic that nearly 50% of all retail spending in the United States is made by the top 10% of earners which is a heck of a dangerous tightrope for the economy. I do think that's the other shoe waiting to drop right this second. If the wealthier Americans get spooked and start to pull back their spending this economy is going to tumble

[–] artyom@piefed.social 71 points 1 day ago (15 children)

The AI bubble will pop long before then, and everyone will have more RAM and GPUs than they know what to do with.

[–] Alloi@lemmy.world 86 points 1 day ago (1 children)

looks at housing bubble "............. god i hope you're right"

As much as private equity wants to think it is, housing is not a commodity like DRAM is.
Housing always has a base value in that people always need places to live, so it's price is sticky. The need for DRAM could disappear overnight if it so happened that way.

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[–] msokiovt@lemmy.today 27 points 1 day ago (4 children)

This is for one purpose if it's true: To force consumers to rent everything, including their computer, so they can be surveilled.

Don't use GeForce NOW, even if there's a Linux client in the works, because it's surveilled too.

[–] dukemirage@lemmy.world 12 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Surveillance isn't the reason, it's a larger and more consistent profit margin.

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