Question Storage/memory Prices going up?

[DEredita]

Is it me, or has memory prices on SSDs and NVMe drives jumped up a noticeable amount since New Years? Examples: Inland's 1TB NVMe was around $99-$109, now it is $140. Samsung's 1TB EVO was around $149-$160, now it is $170. Anyone else notice this?

 

[Arkaign]

SSDs May Get Pricey This Year With NAND Prices Expected to Rise 40%

Enjoy the cheap prices while they last.

www.tomshardware.com

Definitely not just you. It's across the board.

 

[DEredita]

I saw the articles alluding to price increases, including from GamerNexus on YT. I did not expect such a quick increase in pricing. I figured we'd see prices creep up starting somewhere between February and March, but nope, they jumped up immediately after New Years. This puts my build plans on hold, and makes me seriously consider an eGPU solution instead for my existing Intel NUC computer.

 

[Arkaign]

Ah yeah, speaking from seeing how companies like Fry's and Micro Center work, and probably Newegg etc, their purchasers will start seeing increases, and they just mark up what's in the inventory stream anyway due to higher replacement costs. It's not completely 'fair', but it's a pretty slim margin business, they almost depend on a handful of very high margin items to survive (extended replacement plans and severely overpriced cables).

Gas stations do the same thing when there's some event like Katrina or a Mideast scare. They'll mark up what's in the underground feeder tanks that very day despite paying substantially less for it.

 

[Arkaign]

Also, eGPUs are really really really expensive from what I've seen, like $300+ without the dang GPU. Just the stupid case, cabling, and power supply thing. So I've never actually bought one to check out. Have you found a more promising deal on one? I don't think I've even checked on them in the past 16ish months or so.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Definitely not just you. It's across the board.

So, it's not just my imagination, prices on SSDs HAVE risen a bit. Makes me feel better about getting some of those Team MS30 128GB M.2 SATA SSDs for $17.99 ea., a Samsung 500GB 860 EVO for $59.99 on BF-esque, and 10x PNY CS900 250GB SSDs for $35 ea. (Ok, overpaid on those, found out that BestBuy on ebay had the 240GB older models for $28 ea. at the time.) Also snagged a bunch of flash drives recently, including some of those ShellShocker Patriot Glyde 256GB USB3.1 drives for $17.99 ea. too. I though, 256GB-class flash products, under $20, this is GREAT, prices are going down... then the last few days, I'm like, what, are sales over or something? Same Team MS30 128GB M.2 SATA was over $30.

128GB SSDs are prices at where 240GB SSD were dropping down into a month or so ago.

And the bottom kept slowly dropping out of RAM prices, now I'm thinking I should have, or should now, stockpile some of them, before prices rise on RAM too. $47 for a 16GB kit of DDR4-3200, yes please, I'll take several (When I can eke out the money for them.)

 

[ElFenix]

Is it me, or has memory prices on SSDs and NVMe drives jumped up a noticeable amount since New Years? Examples: Inland's 1TB NVMe was around $99-$109, now it is $140. Samsung's 1TB EVO was around $149-$160, now it is $170. Anyone else notice this?

i'm annoyed this thing went up by $30. my SSDs are feeling small nowadays.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Sabrent prices still look pretty low - $140 for their PCIe 3.0 NVMe drive, and $180 for the PCIe 4.0 version. That's for 1TB anyway. But those prices are not as low as last year.

 

[aigomorla]

yeah, im glad i picked up my 3.84TB PM983 for xmas.
That drive went up by 70 dollars in just one month.

 

[arandomguy]

There is a seasonal effect for street pricing for electronics and components in general. Typically prices bottom in Q4 due to aggressive competition for holiday shoppers and than goes back up. Q4 is the highest by far the largest in volume while Q1 is the lowest (for example I think Amazon Q4 revenue is almost the same as Q1+2). Supply in the chain than also takes another hit during the long lunar holiday in Asia.

Essentially unless you buy in Q4 and some of the holdover in early Q1 you're going to face higher average prices in Q1/Q2.

There is also some pressure in NAND supply due to some recent fab issues.

 

[DrMrLordX]

@arandomguy

Not always the case. I bought RAM and an NVMe drive for my Matisse system during Black Friday 2018. My 1 TB Evo went down in price by around $60 in just a few months after Black Friday (but the RAM didn't).

 

[arandomguy]

@arandomguy

Not always the case. I bought RAM and an NVMe drive for my Matisse system during Black Friday 2018. My 1 TB Evo went down in price by around $60 in just a few months after Black Friday (but the RAM didn't).

Yes there can spot sale prices of course cheaper throughout the year, that shouldn't be surprising. Also other situations such as if a generation cycle falls in Q2 you'll get the last clearance type sales which might make any item cheaper than. There can also be some inventory mismanages as well, although that is a lot tighter and better (well for the supply chain) nowadays.

It's just average prices on a whole tend to be lowest in Q4 as the higher volume is there and everyone aggressively competes for it.

In your example case it's because of the NAND price collapse that occurred throughout 2019 (mostly Q1-Q2) had a much greater effect on prices. But the NAND price fall has slowed greatly if not stablized for now, with some forecasts saying it might be trending back up.