The RAM shortage comes for us all • Hacker News Board

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#81

Post by hnuser123456 » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:54 PM UTC

Loic wrote: post #13

I think the OpenAI deal to lock wafers was a wonderful coup. OpenAI is more and more losing ground against the regularity[0] of the improvements coming from Anthropic, Google and even the open weights models. By creating a chock point at the hardware level, OpenAI can prevent the competition from increasing their reach because of the lack of hardware. [0]: For me this is really an important part of working with Claud…

Sure, but if the price is being inflated by inflated demand, then the suppliers will just build more factories until they hit a new, higher optimal production level, and prices will come back down, and eventually process improvements will lead to price-per-GB resuming its overall downtrend.

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#82

Post by pixl97 » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:54 PM UTC

nish__ wrote: post #53

bhhaskin wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if you put up the 10 billion dollars.

Machines are less than 400 million.

And the cost of the people to run those machines, and the factories that are required to run the machines?

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#83

Post by petre » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:55 PM UTC

walterbell wrote: post #44

If the OpenAI Hodling Company buys and warehouses 40% of global memory production or 900,000 memory wafers (i.e. not yet turned into DDR5/DDR6 DIMMs) per month at price X in October 2025, leading to supply shortages and tripling of price, they have the option of later un-holding the warehoused memory wafers for a profit. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46142100#46143535 Had Samsung known SK Hynix was about to co…

Sounds like the Silver Thursday all over again. I hope OpenAI ends up like the Hunt Btothers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_Thursday

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#84

Post by fullstop » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:55 PM UTC

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #69

zoobab wrote: post #55

"dig into that pile of old projects you never finished instead of buying something new this year." You don't need a new PC. Just use the old one.

I just bought some 30pin SIMMs to rehab an old computer. That market is fine.

I have a bag of SIMMs that I saved, no idea why, because I clearly wrote BAD on the mylar bag.

At time time I was messing around with the "badram" patch for Linux.

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#85

Post by mikelitoris » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:55 PM UTC

Companies are adamant about RAMming AI down our throats, it seems.

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#86

Post by diabllicseagull » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:56 PM UTC

radicality wrote: post #46

Think the article should also mention how OpenAI is likely responsible for it. Good article I found from another thread here yesterday: https://www.mooreslawisdead.com/post/sam-altman-s-dirty-dram...

yes. on the moore's law is dead podcast they were talking about rumors where some 'AI enterprise company's representatives' were trying to buy memory in bulk from brick and mortar stores. in some cases openai was mentioned. crazy if true. also interesting considering none of those would be ECC certified like what you would opt for for a commercial server.

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#87

Post by AceJohnny2 » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:56 PM UTC

> And those companies all realized they can make billions more dollars making RAM just for AI datacenter products, and neglect the rest of the market.

I wouldn't ascribe that much intent. More simply, datacenter builders have bought up the entire supply (and likely future production for some time), hence the supply shortfall.

This is a very simple supply-and-demand situation, nothing nefarious about it.

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#88

Post by dylan604 » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:56 PM UTC

Reason077 wrote: post #76

nish__ wrote: post #18

Anyone want to start a fab with me? We can buy an ASML machine and figure out the rest as we go. Toronto area btw

A dozen or so well-resourced tech titans in China are no doubt asking themselves this same question right now. Of course, it takes quite some time for a fab to go from an idea to mass production. Even in China. Expect prices to drop 2-3 years from now when all the new capacity comes online?

At that point, it'll be the opposite problem as more capacity than demand will be available. These new fabs won't be able to pay for themselves. Every tic receives a tok.

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#89

Post by MPSimmons » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:57 PM UTC

This reminds me of the recent LaurieWired video presenting a hypothetical of, "what if we stopped making CPUs": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2OJFqs8bUk

Spoiler, but the answer is basically that old hardware rules the day because it lasts longer and is more reliable of timespans of decades.

DDR5 32GB is currently going for ~$330 on Amazon

DDR4 32GB is currently going for ~$130 on Amazon

DDR3 32GB is currently going for ~50 on Amazon (4x8GB)

For anyone where cost is a concern, using older hardware seems like a particularly easy choice, especially if a person is comfortable with a Linux environment, since the massive droves of recently retired Windows 10 incompatible hardware works great with your Linux distro of choice.

Re: The RAM shortage comes for us all

#90

Post by dylan604 » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 7:57 PM UTC

nish__ wrote: post #28

jacquesm wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope you have very deep pockets. But I'm cheering you on from the sidelines.

Just need a half billion in upfront investment. And thank you for the support :)

So, playing the Mega Powerball are you?