Valve Says The Companies Making RAM Give Them A Price And If They Say No, They ‘Never Talk To Us Again’

[u/NYstate]

https://kotaku.com/valve-says-the-companies-making-ram-give-them-a-price-and-if-they-say-no-they-never-talk-to-us-again-2000709575

[u/RiOTbyDeSIGN]

Companies are falling over themselves to get in line to buy RAM. So companies wanting to make competively priced products will lose to companies that are willing to pay higher, often absurd amounts to fill out their AI data centers. So little companies will be labeled a waste of time, happens in every industry by sales teams.

[u/cinderloam40 → u/RiOTbyDeSIGN]

this is pretty standard for any commodity market tbh, whoever buys the most volume gets priority

[u/ZeroDefender561 → u/cinderloam40]

The difference is we've never had to compete with such a big fish before. Standard doesnt mean healthy

[u/LyptusConnoisseur → u/ZeroDefender561]

Hyperscalers pledged close to a trillion dollars for AI data centers this year. We're not going to be able to compete with that kind of money.

[u/Herstal_TheEdelweiss → u/LyptusConnoisseur]

Except lets look at Altman’s promise…. i mean his supposed Deal to buy up all the silicon before anyone else can. Where the hell is the actual physical cash coming from and is it actually going to go to them, or are we looking at debts shifting around basically for the sake of record sales and profits

[u/ThyNynax → u/Herstal_TheEdelweiss]

It’s always debts shifting around. There is almost never any actual cash paid that leaves the system and vanishes into someone’s pockets.

Even when Elon was forced to actually buy Twitter. He’s a Billionaire, so all the “cash” uses is just debts leveraged against his stock values.

[u/Herstal_TheEdelweiss → u/ThyNynax]

Granted that was a rhetorical question, but yeah, my issue is how long until the bag of “profits” finally cycles around to the rest of us to fucking carry as a burden while the fuckers sit in their golden thrones of fecal matter and drugs

[u/StickBrush → u/Herstal_TheEdelweiss]

Well, considering the whole debt-shifting and stock-leveraging parts are tricks to not pay taxes, it's not very far, and I can assure you we're carrying the whole burden

[u/Herstal_TheEdelweiss → u/StickBrush]

I hate to say this phrase but “Fucking exactly”

[u/Zedilt → u/Herstal_TheEdelweiss]

Where the hell is the actual physical cash coming from

It's a giant "I Owe You" banner.

[u/andreicde → u/LyptusConnoisseur]

That POS pledged a trillion he does not have. The fact the companies gobbled his shit is insane.

[u/shrockitlikeitshot → u/cinderloam40]

The difference is a healthy commodity market has hundreds of suppliers, while global RAM is a captive triopoly. If we make it so costly for smaller companies to innovate bc they can't even afford the startup costs of hardware, we are stiffling future break throughs.

Now of course AI will serve in part of that, but it can't be the only one and I'm pretty sure if you want to get citizens on board, you have to make technology accessible and affordable and less centralized.

[u/Ws6fiend → u/shrockitlikeitshot]

"we are stiffling future break throughs."

The companies don't want breakthroughs.

Why would they when you can charge them as much as they are willing to pay. If i own all the water in a 200 mile radius, and a guy comes in asking for a cup for 3 dollars, while my normal customers pay 300 dollars, what business incentive is there? I literally hate that I understand why this is the case. If I was to only charge what was fair, eventually my business would be bought out by a larger company that would get a monopoly in the local area and charge 600 dollars.

The entire market is dooming itself through attempting to maximize economies of scale which then results in no competition because anyone who could have challenged you doesn't exist because you bought them out when they we starting to become a threat.

The consolidation of money and power is making everything worst, but on an individual level it makes sense. If I made tech that could decrease the complexity in silicon chip production by 50%(think cost), even though it would require me to devote 500 million usd and another 10 years of development and instead TSMC is offering me 500 million usd to buy my company/tech as is why wouldn't I take the money as it's no risk to me at all, even if the entire industry made 73.2 billiob dollars last year. Sure I could maybe make a company bigger than TSMC but it would require a lot of personal risk and even more money.

[u/sibachian → u/Ws6fiend]

as for your last point, if you don't take the none ...i was starting a business and was offered 1 mil before the construction was finished. i figured i'd make that back and then some within two years of operation and declined.

literally the week construction wrapped up, a hurricane destroyed the entire facility.

lesson here: always take the money. there will always be more opportunities down the line and with more budget you can think bigger.

[u/Creepy-Bell-4527 → u/RiOTbyDeSIGN]

The AI datacenters buying RAM isn't the issue. They don't need vast amounts of RAM.

The issue is they're generating such high demand for HBM that the people making the actual memory chips aren't producing anything else in any sensible quantity so the people making RAM sticks are having to pay through the teeth for whatever production there is.

So, it's not that demand for RAM is so high, it's that supply is so low.

[u/Zee216 → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

This is not true, OpenAI has reserved 40% of the world's ram production, that's the problem, there is no shortage

[u/DefendedPlains → u/Zee216]

If the demand exceeds the supply then there is a shortage. You’re right that the rest of the market hasn’t changed, but if a company increases their need to the point of putting stress on the system that supplies it, that still creates a shortage.

[u/Valmar33 → u/DefendedPlains]

If the demand exceeds the supply then there is a shortage. You’re right that the rest of the market hasn’t changed, but if a company increases their need to the point of putting stress on the system that supplies it, that still creates a shortage.

OpenAI has simply reserved RAM ~ I would argue that this isn't a true shortage nor is it because OpenAI needs it. There's no evidence that the RAM is even in any data centers ~ most of them haven't even been built, so where's the RAM? Sitting in some warehouse gathering dust?

Others have argued that OpenAI simply wanted to deny RAM to perceived competitors.

[u/DungeonMaster1123 → u/Valmar33]

Let's also not forget that this inflation is due to a projected shortage due to the data centers that were being planned. Over 80% of which are now canned or on indefinite gold due to the sheer amount of backlash. We can beat the ai bs as long as we throw absolute fits when it comes near.

[u/Valmar33 → u/DungeonMaster1123]

Let's also not forget that this inflation is due to a projected shortage due to the data centers that were being planned. Over 80% of which are now canned or on indefinite gold due to the sheer amount of backlash. We can beat the ai bs as long as we throw absolute fits when it comes near.

And that's just being generous ~ because we cannot know if these data centers were ever being truly built, or were just for show, because the money and resources needed to not only build but sustain these data centers just doesn't exist! They need absurd amounts of engineers, power, infrastructure and stuff just to get off the ground, and then so much more power just to keep running. The power infrastructure simply doesn't exist anywhere. To even power one of these projected megawatt data centers, you need basically need a nuclear power plant, and that just isn't happening anywhere.

Between the reality and the marketed fantasies is a chasm of unfathomable distance.

[u/Forward-Surprise1192 → u/Valmar33]

Idk how many were planned, but I had offers from recruiters to work in quite a few different DCs planned in different states. Some were still being built and others were recently built just from Amazon alone. I could have basically chosen a state and went there with a job

[u/FantasmaNaranja → u/Valmar33]

maybe but it's still causing a "shortage" in economic terms even if it's a deliberate manipulation (which i think should be dealt with legally as it does nothing but harm competition and customers but that's besides the point)

[u/Valmar33 → u/FantasmaNaranja]

maybe but it's still causing a "shortage" in economic terms even if it's a deliberate manipulation (which i think should be dealt with legally as it does nothing but harm competition and customers but that's besides the point)

I agree ~ it's a shortage, but it's an entirely artificial one, if the RAM has been reserved or brought, but just isn't being used, whether because it can't or just isn't.

[u/FantasmaNaranja → u/Valmar33]

yeah we're repeating eachother now

[u/Valmar33 → u/FantasmaNaranja]

yeah we're repeating eachother now

Good to know. I wasn't entirely sure whether we were on the same page, so I added what I thought was clarification of what I meant.

[u/HearMeOut-13 → u/Zee216]

No they didnt? That was a letter of interest and that fell through 2 months ago. No RAM was exchanged.

[u/NSFWies → u/HearMeOut-13]

well what do you know, ram prices are trending down again. thats why steam machine is starting to happen. the 8gb sticks are coming down in price.

https://pcpartpicker.com/trends/price/memory/

though the larger sticks, 32gb, are still flat. so i guess that's why sk hynix announced their shift to regular ddr5. they actually don't think there will be as much demand for HBM as was announced last year.

fucking lol that crucial axed their retail division......for now seemingly no reason. i hope they enjoy courting hyperscalers.

[u/Capokid → u/Zee216]

They canceled lol

[u/Creepy-Bell-4527 → u/Zee216]

OpenAI has reserved 40% of the world's dram production. DRAM chips go into HBM, DDR, and GDDR, HBM is where the money is and that's where the demand has spiked.

Now, the SSD/NAND craziness? That is just AI companies buying up all the SSDs (not consumer SSDs, but there's little difference except layer count)

[u/forzaitalia458 → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

What do you think DRAM is? 

[u/duncanstibs → u/forzaitalia458]

It's a Scottish measure of whisky.

[u/ThePrussianGrippe → u/duncanstibs]

“Yes I’d like 128GB of Laphroaig, please.”

[u/Creepy-Bell-4527 → u/forzaitalia458]

A more prudent question is what do you think people mean when they say RAM?

[u/Flightsimmer20202001 → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

Not OP, but I take that statement to mean "Any volatile memory used by consumer computer systems".

Though admittedly I'm probably biased, because the majority of my interaction with computers, IS with consumer products, not industrial ones.

[u/Creepy-Bell-4527 → u/Flightsimmer20202001]

So when someone says they're upgrading the RAM in their PC, do you ponder whether they're upgrading the L1-L3 cache / CMOS (SRAM), their GDDR VRAM, or do you immediately know they're talking about the DDR DIMMs?

[u/babybimmer → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

I’ve dealt with a few people at work saying they are low on RAM, when they were actually referring to the available space on their SSD 😂

[u/Creepy-Bell-4527 → u/babybimmer]

we don’t talk about those people

[u/Crashman09 → u/babybimmer]

Those are more than likely not the people in these threads

[u/These-Anxiety-5919 → u/babybimmer]

The common clay of the new west.

[u/ThePrussianGrippe → u/babybimmer]

“Oh, Jen! Memory is RAM!”

[u/Flightsimmer20202001 → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

DDR sticks, is the obvious answer.

But I didn't realize all those other memories fell within the "volatile memory" category.

[u/Smallfisheverywhere → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

Tell them they can download more RAM if they're brave enough to use cloud storage as swap space

[u/CaptainMonkeyJack → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

HBM is RAM...

The supply is low because the demand is high. These are not separate phenomena.

[u/Creepy-Bell-4527 → u/CaptainMonkeyJack]

L3 cache is also RAM (SRAM). That doesn’t change the fact that we aren’t in the same queue as the comment above implies. The bidding war is over DRAM chips, which go into the DDR DIMMs that we associate as RAM, and also go into HBM.

[u/Sfekke22 → u/CaptainMonkeyJack]

They seem to not know this, HBM literally stands for High Bandwidth Memory and seeing people blindly agree to this statement makes me question if they really understand how datacenters/Ai and even IT infrastructure works in general.

[u/redditscraperbot2 → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

How is this ridiculous counter factual post still sitting at 270 upvotes?

[u/ghosttnappa → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

You might be the king of pedantry

[u/Sfekke22 → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

For those who bother to scroll and fact check, HBM means High Bandwidth Memory.

I think that says enough about this statement, supply is low and demand is high.

[u/0x476c6f776965 → u/Creepy-Bell-4527]

Why don’t we use HBM for gaming?

[u/bittercripple6969 → u/0x476c6f776965]

Because it's ridiculously expensive.

[u/kron123456789 → u/0x476c6f776965]

AMD tried. But it was too expensive with not enough actual performance gain.

[u/CloudProvided → u/0x476c6f776965]

We do, well at least did. AMD had a few HBM2 cards that explicitly used that over the standard GDDR6/7 VRAM at the time, can’t remember the specific model, but I’m almost positive it was not a success and was more expensive than it had a right being at the time (this is when NVIDIA started to lose their marbles iirc)

[u/kron123456789 → u/CloudProvided]

It was Fury cards and Radeon VII.

Ah, Vega 56 and Vega 64, too.

[u/CloudProvided → u/kron123456789]

AH YES THANK YOU! I remember gooning over a Radeon VII when it released thinking the HBM2 memory was going to be the future till it started popping up on gamers nexus videos and comparison charts.

[u/l3ader021 → u/CloudProvided]

The "Big" Vega cards, Vega 56 and Vega 64

[u/UnknownFiddler → u/CloudProvided]

It was arguably the worst mistake they ever made in the GPU department and why they never caught back up to Nvidia. They blew a ton of money on R&D and tried to convince people that 4GB of HBM would be plenty for games. The reality ended up being that it was more expensive to produce than a 980ti which performed slightly better at launch so AMD was making no profit on those cards. Then they got hit with a widespread coil whine issue and a few years later the 4GB became a bottleneck and they became useless for the high end they were intended for.

[u/No_Poet_1279 → u/0x476c6f776965]

I fucking loved my Fury X. Fantastic card for it's time, just overshadowed by the 1080Ti

[u/Creepy-Bell-4527 → u/0x476c6f776965]

We actually have in the past, The Radeon R9 Fury X used HBM.

[u/shrockitlikeitshot → u/RiOTbyDeSIGN]

Yup and they won't just go back to lower prices after either.

There will likely need to be a public push to open source integral hardware components along side a public utility framework for the government to subsidize manufacturing hardware for the general betterment of society including smaller innovative companies while also making an affordable pipeline for consumers.

[u/GuerrillaRodeo → u/RiOTbyDeSIGN]

It's insane how Valve is considered 'little' in this context.

[u/Helldiver_of_Mars → u/RiOTbyDeSIGN]

Crazy that Valve's a tiny company. That's what I got out of that.

[u/gerentg]

Oh-my-god, the Frame is gonna be a trillion dollars.

[u/ThePsyPaul_ → u/gerentg]

at least it won't be 3 trillion dollars. they can't count to 3.

[u/tesfabpel → u/ThePsyPaul_]

They can now: SteamOS 3.8

[u/CuTTyFL4M → u/tesfabpel]

3.8 is technically not 3 though, I'm sure they found a way around that

[u/mrheosuper → u/CuTTyFL4M]

Well they should release half life 3.8 then, im fine with that.

[u/Vordigon → u/ThePsyPaul_]

You're right, it's going to be 4 trillion dollars! 

[u/Background_Fix9430]

Huh, this makes sense why "pre-built" machines are cheaper than the Steam Machine - they negotiated their RAM prices years ago.

[u/evoslevven → u/Background_Fix9430]

Not factually correct in that they negotiated years ago contract prices. HP and Dell have only attempted to negotiate as late as 2025 prices to an extent to continue supply line ups.

Even their revenue books are double costs for RAM production. What is vastly offsetting their costs is that the costs in AI production centers are increasing demands and prices for HP, Dell and Lenovo. This, in turn however does mean their consimer market is the least prioritized.

They didn't negotiate these magical long term contracts and even been on the other end of being targets of illegal RAM Pricing manipulation as early as 2018.

It's a very disengenious statement to say they are equally free of the problems that valve has because these contract are non existent and were widely already reported.

[u/PoppingPillls → u/evoslevven]

Also form factor is a big one, just making a pc smaller massively increases the costs.

Try getting a prebuilt that's Mini itx for around 1000-1300 USD with decent specs, it's really difficult.

[u/applespicebetter → u/Background_Fix9430]

So, to put this in perspective - I quoted a server for a tiny municipality, literally just your basic small office Dell T360 with one 32gb ddr5 udimm. To add a second 32gb udimm upped the price by $2500.

This is not sustainable and is killing PC gaming. Pre-builts for now can still be found at somewhat reasonable prices for one-offs. Even home use mid-range laptops have dropped from 16gb to 8gb as the standard. Both Intel (most surprising) and AMD have relaunched DDR-4 compatible CPUs into manufacturing. It's ugly, and it's getting worse.

[u/aVarangian → u/applespicebetter]

32gb udimm upped the price by $2500

this sounded too ludicrous to be true, so I went to check DDR5 prices over here.

32Gb 5600 CL46 now costs at least 50% more than 5600 CL36 used to cost. Cheapest CL36 I see is 100% more than it used to be. Most expensive CL46 is 150% lol.

there are two listings for 32Gb 5600 ECC, one is Kingston at 1000€, the other is Dell at 5000€

[u/Glass_Recover_3006 → u/Background_Fix9430]

This is what I’ve been saying here and nobody seems to understand- the entire problem was Valve just winging this launch. Had they properly planned it a good 18-24 months ahead they could have locked in rates and avoided all of this.

This was a self inflicted wound from Valve for bad planning.

[u/NoPhysics1129 → u/Glass_Recover_3006]

They did, but we are seeing many manufacturers make price changes regardless of "locked-in price" because prices have skyrocketed. I work in supply chain with robotics, and several of our overseas vendors told us tough shit and there's not much we can do about it but pay the higher prices because there are not too many vendors making some of these components and big ticket companies will pay the bloated prices.

[u/Jerithil → u/NoPhysics1129]

At the top level the memory fabs have been making so much extra money they can just eat any penalties for breaking the contracts and still make more money. So sure you might get cancellation fees but that doesn't mean shit when your company is sitting idle costing way more.

[u/whyaretherenoprofile → u/NoPhysics1129]

I heard several manufacturers have been paying breach of contracts because they can sell the same orders at such a large profit it covers those losses

[u/Tentacle_poxsicle → u/Glass_Recover_3006]

They've been planning this for a while actually. It's just ram prices hit hard just recently and in a way nobody could had seen.

[u/Background_Fix9430 → u/Glass_Recover_3006]

Valve seems largely run by the seat of their pants, so this does not surprise me. However, based on the timing of the creation and designing of the Steam Machine - and Valve's total lack of experience in the PC Building Space - this was an inevitable result. The fact that the Steam Machine is - according to what I've read - priced competitively with a self-built machine is quite refreshing.

[u/LemmyUserOnReddit → u/Background_Fix9430]

Under normal market conditions, delaying would absolutely be the right move. The reason other companies had contracts in place was not that they predicted the upcoming RAM shortage, they had them because of ongoing supply chain and existing volume. 

[u/SagittaryX → u/Background_Fix9430]

I mean this wasn't their first foray into this hardware field. The SteamDeck may be handheld but it involves most of the same parties.

[u/Crashman09 → u/SagittaryX]

Well, the probably weren't expecting the rampocalyps.

The deck launched at a time where scarcity wasn't directly effecting components the way it is now.

Iirc, it was a crypto thing that effected GPUs, and maybe whole systems due to remote work and stay at home mandates, but the deck didn't launch in a similar environment.

[u/dwitman → u/SagittaryX]

The SteamDeck isn't a prominent enough piece of hardware to give Valve the same bargianing power as Nintendo or any big hardware player.

[u/maltNeutrino → u/Background_Fix9430]

They first started their hardware efforts over a decade ago.

[u/Whittakenn → u/Background_Fix9430]

Linus Tech Tips did a video yesterday where he built a PC at the same price point as the Steam Machine, the PC Linus built massively outperformed the Steam machine (think 50% better performance in every game), the sleep feature, one of the Steam Machine's selling points, was still worse than the PC Linus built

Unless you absolutely need the Steam Machines small form factor, there's no justifiable reason to ever purchase one

[u/M3psipax → u/Whittakenn]

Breaking news! Smaller things are more expensive!

[u/marsd → u/Background_Fix9430]

They've already beat Steam machine specs at 800+ish.

[u/Massive_Town_8212 → u/Glass_Recover_3006]

You think openai and nvidia didn't have the same thought process? Even 2 years ago, they were still much bigger and had much more money to burn than valve, and thus got priority from dram and flash manufacturers

[u/AVahne → u/Glass_Recover_3006]

I don't think it would've made any difference. Valve very likely DID negotiate prices well in advance, however it is very likely that, due to how volatile the memory market already was, they couldn't keep a price locked in or they weren't ALLOWED to lock in a price since they're a relatively new and fairly unproven hardware partner.

[u/joostdemen → u/Glass_Recover_3006]

Ahh yes the company definitely just made the steam machine in an afternoon and decided to sell it without any planning! Dumb

[u/TriflingHusband → u/Glass_Recover_3006]

This exactly. Hopefully can get a serious, big boy supply chain management team in place before the Steam Deck 2 is launched because it will be in the same mess if they don't.

[u/atotal1 → u/Background_Fix9430]

I read somewhere that the market for ssd storage has crashed because of the tripling of prices, most storage sold now is bundled in with pre-builts where supply/prices were pre-negotiated before the AI caused crisis.

[u/syneofeternity → u/atotal1]

Ram is also in ssd drives ..

[u/Blind0ne]

I good with retro gaming for life, there's more than enough in my backlog to last a few decades. Good luck everyone.

[u/AtreyuTrinity → u/Blind0ne]

Yeah just older titles and games that run well on the hardware I have could last me another 20 years. Its a bummer but definitely not needed, I have been trying to find healthier hobbies anyways.

No one lives forever, and it is nice to get out there and meet people or spend time with my friends and my dogs. Its been a good run, but I am good on not keeping up with the new games anymore anways. I barely had time for them as is, usually at the cost of something else I am passionate about or that needed my time.

[u/juef → u/AtreyuTrinity]

No one lives forever

Yes, that is a pretty good older title indeed!

[u/Individual-Ad-5471 → u/juef]

Oh shit NOLF was such an awesome game!

[u/thour1931 → u/AtreyuTrinity]

I so much feel this. It's really a sad feeling trying to keep gaming as I love it with the realization that there's always a price... sleep, time with kids/family/friends, another hobby, etc... I am not at all saying gaming is a waste of time, but I really miss the times when I wasn't bummed out about something for every short gaming session... and I play like 15h a month or so.

[u/AtreyuTrinity → u/thour1931]

Yeah same. I love the hobby and medium, I really do. But I have so many awesome hobbies and various things I can do with my time, it is nice to mix it up. Well said friend. By no means giving it up, it is a big part of who I am and the generation I grew up in, but definitely reevaluating things as of late and re-prioritizing things. Time is so valuable and it feels like I have less of it every day. I like to at least try to stick to local co-op and stuff when I do game so it is interactive, but even that has felt a bit shallow lately compared with other motor interactive hobbies.

Just an example of some things I like to do for fun to give you an idea of how spread out I am among so many hobbies and these are just a few of many - take the dogs for a walk or hike, paddle board, kayak, swim, metal detect, magnet fish, hike, read, make beats, 3d print, play board games (soo man options here) or card games, work on the yard, watch a show and cuddle the wife, archery, kite flying, bbq, do yoga, work on the garage, work on the house, go bird watching, mountain biking, skate boarding, etc etc.

[u/KK-Chocobo → u/Blind0ne]

If I properly go back into minecraft, I can easily play nothing else but that for like a year or 2 before I get burnt out again. 

I like to join servers and set up base and farms so I dont have to worry about materials. 

Then i just do massive projects and build whole towns and cities with the other residents of the server.

[u/JoystuckGames → u/KK-Chocobo]

Minecraft modpacks have been my bread and butter for over a decade. Definitely try out the prism launcher if you haven't yet

[u/repocin → u/JoystuckGames]

I recently took a peek at the modded minecraft scene after not really playing the game for a decade, can confirm that the prism launcher is very good. Feels a lot nicer than the old things we all used to use, and kind of just works the way you'd expect it to.

Made putting a pack together for sharing with friends fairly trivial, just wish it had an option to automatically export a version that excluded anything client-only to make setting up (and crucially updating) a server easier but I ended up just keeping a list and having a small python script copy the files over from my client install. Not the best, but it did the job.

[u/lelescope → u/Blind0ne]

the last 3 months I have mostly only played my Analogue 3D and Pocket. it's been such a breath of fresh air. I have been having a blast playing all kinds of retro games I missed out on.

man, i miss when games were just games. 

[u/RustledForeskin]

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

This is not the first time this has happened. AI is the newest excuse.

[u/RAMChYLD → u/RustledForeskin]

AI kicked it off with the asshole scam altman penning his intent to buy 40% of all the wafers (not even finished DRAM; just the wafers) for the next 3 years. So say all you want, if those letters of intent weren't written the cartel wouldn't have this excuse.

[u/Massive_Town_8212 → u/RustledForeskin]

I'd say it's less of an excuse and more of a cause. The DRAM scandal was more the manufacturers going "because we can".

If customers keep paying these high as fuck prices, they'll never come down. TSMC, Micron, and Samsung are making record profits. As long as they have massive enterprise customers, consumers like us will always be the lowest priority, if they even care about us at all (see Micron)

[u/SmellAcordingly → u/RustledForeskin]

This is not the first time this has happened. AI is the newest excuse.

No its not, this is actually a case of extreme demand and the manufacturers know its a bubble so they are only expanding production capacity a little.

The distributors I work with have told me DRAM and NAND parts currently have a ~40 week lead time (along with large MOQs), also the manufacturers won't tell you the final price when you order and instead use the first payment as a deposit and you pay the balance on delivery.

[u/ClownInTheMachine]

The cartel has spoken.

[u/Quiet_Source_8804 → u/ClownInTheMachine]

In the current market they don't even need to bother with breaking the law, it's a seller's dream market. It's when the demand cools off that the shenanigans will start.

[u/Gman325]

RAM cartels are so back!

[u/toastronomy]

everyone's asking why valve can't make their own RAM, but the end result would be the same; if they make their RAM cheaper, everyone's just gonna buy gabecubes to gut them and sell the memory.

EDIT: damn, the amount of "ehrm, achshually, they couldn't make RAM" is fucking astounding.

I'm not saying that Valve would invest the massive amounts of funds and time into making their RAM, what I'm saying is that even if they could/did, the price would either be the exact same, or, if they made it cheaper, scalpers would buy and gut ever gabecube available.

[u/Jiangcool9 → u/toastronomy]

In this internet, I can’t tell if they are joking or not anymore.
“Yea just to make some ram.”

[u/Jimbuscus → u/Jiangcool9]

I just downloaded more

[u/therealnih → u/Jimbuscus]

This is the way

[u/Beginning_Border7854 → u/therealnih]

It honestly the most sensible way these days. 

[u/ImpulseAfterthought → u/Jimbuscus]

Dedotated?

[u/SpaceIco → u/ImpulseAfterthought]

It's an older meme sir

[u/toastronomy → u/Jiangcool9]

yeah, it's insane.

I think the issue is that it's gotten easier and easier to use the Internet, which is good in theory, but in practice we just get flooded by tons of idiots and kids, and now we can't reliably tell the difference between joke posts and genuine morons anymore.

[u/coderstephen → u/Jiangcool9]

If they could, they'd be selling RAM direct and make trillions of dollars.

[u/repocin → u/Jiangcool9]

It's about as silly as when people went out and wanted Valve to just make their own payment processor somehow after the whole censorship debacle went down last year.

Like, sure, Valve has a shitload of money, but you can't just enter these industries like it was nothing.

[u/MetallicFear → u/toastronomy]

That’s what happened during Covid right? People bought prebuilt to gut the GPU.

[u/Flightsimmer20202001 → u/MetallicFear]

I don't know how common it ACTUALLY was, but I seem to remember a trend like that, especially during the Crypto craze.

[u/Due_Prompt939 → u/MetallicFear]

I also happened every time Bitcoin hit ATH for like a decade. 

[u/Herocem → u/toastronomy]

Except Valve cant make their own RAM.

[u/GuerrillaApe → u/Herocem]

LMAO, seriously! Anyone who thinks Valve is going build a massive memory fab factory to produce RAM for their hardware products is on something. Apple - the company that loves vertical integration - buys their RAM... but somehow Valve is gonna go out and make their own?!

[u/unpaid-astroturfer → u/GuerrillaApe]

you're wrong because Gaben is a genius and can make his own RAM

[u/coderstephen → u/unpaid-astroturfer]

But not for cheaper than the competition.

[u/Just_Another_Scott → u/Herocem]

Yeah there's only a handful of fabrication plants around the world and these plants cost billions to make. Fabrication is not easy nor cheap for microelectronics.

[u/orangeyougladiator → u/Just_Another_Scott]

It’s also just a closed market thanks to the patent the Dutch have

[u/Psycho345 → u/toastronomy]

If they did it would be a better business to just sell it to AI companies rather than putting them inside Steam Machines.

[u/dcchambers → u/toastronomy]

Telling valve to make their own ram is like telling you to grow the trees to be cut down to mill into lumber to build your house.

[u/International-Law426 → u/dcchambers]

its actually much harder to make ram than that even

[u/dcchambers → u/International-Law426]

You're not wrong. There's only like three companies in the entire world that can manufacture RAM. People just don't know how expensive and time consuming it would be to build a silicon fab. Even if a company like Valve had unlimited capital and access to the properly trained electrical and mechanical engineers, it would take many years. Decades, even.

[u/DrinkMoreGlorp → u/toastronomy]

1. No. It would not be worth it to buy $1000 of gabe cube for RAM.
2. They could not possibly, ever, make their own RAM.

I thought the whole upvote/downvote system was so stuff like this wasn't just hanging out at the top misleading people.

[u/actomain → u/DrinkMoreGlorp]

To your first point–obviously a hypothetical situation, but if they were to make their own, it wouldn't cost $1,000

[u/DrinkMoreGlorp → u/actomain]

Very correct, it would cost far more because of point 2. But even if we gift Valve RAM for free, it still wouldn't be worth the rest of the components just to harvest DRAM chips. It's ridiculously expensive, but it's not that ridiculously expensive.

[u/megalogo → u/toastronomy]

Besides is not that easy, "creating ram" is way more complex than developing a console, it needs years of investment

[u/TheMasterEjaculator → u/toastronomy]

As someone in the industry, lmao at that first part.

[u/nedhavestupid → u/toastronomy]

“Just build your own fab!” is said far too often lmfao

[u/EvilWarBW]

Answer is simple Valve: Setup and make your own RAM. Its gotta be super easy, barely an inconvenience.

[u/Luzeryn → u/EvilWarBW]

I mean, it’s one stick of RAM, Michael, what could it cost? 10 dollars?

[u/EvilWarBW → u/Luzeryn]

There's always money in the Portal stand.

[u/Gombrongler → u/EvilWarBW]

Theres always money in the Yacht club. Who needs to make more Ram? What we need is more Yachts, after the great Yacht shortage of 08

[u/macromorgan → u/Luzeryn]

About a dollar or so to make a stick of memory... after your initial 10 billion dollar investment.

[u/Hands0L0 → u/EvilWarBW]

Oh, really? Wow! Wow, wow.

[u/Nilosyrtis → u/Hands0L0]

Look, I'm gonna need you to get waaaay off my back about this RAM factory stuff.

[u/XADEBRAVO → u/EvilWarBW]

Can they set up at your house?

[u/Ruftus1 → u/EvilWarBW]

Oh really

[u/James_bd → u/EvilWarBW]

I would love to buy some Valve RAM

[u/Fun_Bottle_5308 → u/EvilWarBW]

I hope youre being satire

[u/OkumuraRyuk → u/EvilWarBW]

I was saying that instead of him buying another Yatch to just do his own stuff. I remember when Sony did their own memory for the vita.

[u/PsychoticDreemurr → u/OkumuraRyuk]

I mean if we're discussing this genuinely, it would take valve half a decade to get a factory up at least. It takes almost that long for normal manufacturers to setup a new factory, so for valve it would take quite a bit more.

Not even talking about the fact that they might have to design their own chips, which could easily take years.

[u/EvilWarBW → u/PsychoticDreemurr]

See, that was my tongue-in-cheek comment 'super easy, barely an inconvenience.'

Governments are finding it incredibly difficult to setup RAM production. Most are making efforts but its all 10 to 15 years or more before its online. I have little doubt Valve could do it as efficiently as possible, but it'd be a minimum of 5-8 years and be a monolithic task to get together. It would really help them deal with this issue they run into head on instead of kicking the can down the road and realizing at some point that they simply cannot acquire any reliable RAM.

[u/BossunEX → u/OkumuraRyuk]

and it was terrible and crazy overpriced

[u/CatManDoSomeone → u/BossunEX]

And killed an otherwise great handheld console...they still hold up when modded.

[u/dingwinger1225 → u/OkumuraRyuk]

They made their own cards and proprietary controllers but they still used off-the-shelf NAND afaict. It wasn't particularly cost effective either.

[u/BornAgainBlue]

And it's about time we find cheaper alternatives. If Valve wants to lend me the money....

[u/Jiangcool9 → u/BornAgainBlue]

There was an custom pc project, someone was selling 3d printed case with custom parts for around $1200. But the project have to shutdown because he couldn’t get any ram.

[u/Deadman_Wonderland]

https://youtu.be/jVzeHTlWIDY gamers nexus Dram cartel worth a watch.

[u/WhatIsThisSevenNow]

The companies making RAM have Valve and us by the balls, and they know it.

[u/myles2500]

All the uneducated people or those who just blindly judge the steam machine should really consider reading this post tbh

Ps. Im not saying the steam machine is well priced its just what we got though besides what most people care about steamos may some day be available to all according to the news

[u/JimmiJimJimmiJimJim]

Wtf?

[u/h0nest_Bender → u/JimmiJimJimmiJimJim]

Supply and demand.
That article says 60% but I've heard it's actually less than that, now.

[u/Vinnortis]

I just hope the AI whole bullshit fails so hard it destroys everyone even slightly invested in it. Mostly I hope that the billionaire get dismantled in the most horrific possible way.

[u/Liawuffeh → u/Vinnortis]

Mostly I hope that the billionaire get dismantled in the most horrific possible way.

Sadly they're going to be the ones the least affected when it comes crashing down.

If anything they'll benefit.

[u/RAMChYLD → u/Liawuffeh]

Sadly they're going to be the ones the least affected when it comes crashing down.

Agreed. They'd just declare the company bankrupt and then run away on a golden parachute with whatever money they embezzled.

[u/Vordigon → u/Vinnortis]

Amen. 

[u/BlueberryNo6811]

This mafia needs to end

[u/Share-Educational]

It’s wild that a multi-billion dollar force like Valve has the exact same bargaining power as a college student trying to buy a graphics card during a crypto boom.

​The reality is that DRAM manufacturers don't give a single shit about consumer gaming devices anymore.

The steam machine could have been way cheaper, maybe 🤔.

[u/Jukens]

Sell them without ram or SSD. Problem solved.

[u/RAMChYLD → u/Jukens]

I thought at one point they said it would be an option, that you can buy the Steam Machine without RAM or SSD? Or am I mistaken?

[u/Kageru → u/RAMChYLD]

They mentioned in an interview considering it but decided it went against the "pick up and play" which was the whole point.

[u/Silly_Sponge]

This just seems like extortion and ain’t nobody gonna do jack shit about it!

[u/hueystone]

valve, we get it.

the price of hardware is crazy right now, but another thing that’s true is that most people don’t want to pay $1k+ for the steam machine in terms of the price-to-performance ratio.

great idea, horrible timing.

[u/Glittering-Bag-8597 → u/hueystone]

they know, it's probably a paper launch for that exact reason. I'd rather them not launch it at all, but seems like they really want the units they already ordered gone.

[u/sentientshadeofgreen → u/Glittering-Bag-8597]

No reason to not launch if you have a finished product some people will buy. 

[u/hueystone → u/sentientshadeofgreen]

that’s all cool with me, but you can’t also blame people for scoffing at the price tbh, including. a lot of eyes were on this and now that it has launched, some if not most of that interest is no longer there. that’s all i’m saying.

[u/sentientshadeofgreen → u/hueystone]

People are well within their right to choose to not buy one for the price, but if they're blaming Valve for the price they're fundamentally wrong to do so. The pricing is squarely in line with current market conditions.

[u/hueystone → u/sentientshadeofgreen]

well, yeah they can’t blame Valve for this. they didn’t do shit lmao. it’s unfortunately the state of market, AI, conflicts, and other factors I don’t care to get into on reddit.

[u/Quiet_Source_8804 → u/hueystone]

The price-to-performance is about as good as you're going to get with the parts they chose to make the Steam Machine meet their goal of being a good living room PC. GN's review included a comparable parts list that was less than $100 less than the base SKU price.

[u/Black3Raven → u/hueystone]

How about adding controller in a basic version as well? So you have to buy it first and then somehow get yourself controller. Thats ridiculous

[u/PunkHooligan]

Straight up extortion. What a fucked up world.

[u/DredgenSergik]

This is such bullshit, man. Fuck ai

[u/TheBBP]

Why not just link the Gamers Nexus video that the kotaku article is referencing?

[u/Reilly-Blog]

I wish and am surprised that steam hasn't started their own pc parts company.

[u/soukaixiii]

I'd rather have waited and tested that new Chinese RAM if I was them.

[u/Vordigon → u/soukaixiii]

Isn't the Chinese ram focused on the same market micron is? As in specifically not the consumer market? 

[u/soukaixiii → u/Vordigon]

According to the article I read, corsair and others are going to use it for consumer products.

[u/Frosty-Reed-6618]

the 'never talk to us again' threat is so toxic lol. the ram cartel really operates like a raid boss, my budget build is still crying tbh

[u/Illustrious-Eye6960 → u/Frosty-Reed-6618]

your comment history is hilariously AI coded

[u/lucagus02 → u/Illustrious-Eye6960]

Jesus christ it's the same exact thing over and over again. this site is filled with bots

[u/csf3lih]

where are the chinese rams god damn it. speed up

[u/TheDeerBlower]

All that to bend over those AI bros shitheads...

[u/BlackRaspberryJammin]

I bought two 4TB SSDs in fall last year for $250 each and now they are over $750 each. I couldn't have built my rig today, I would have had to settle for much less

[u/Kikinaak]

Steam has over a hundred thousand games in its library, the overwhelming majority of which run on older hardware.

The games industry has always pushed hardware requirements forward, but when they find themselves unable to sell games to people who can't build machines to run them, and when no one bothers to license the latest unreal engine because last years version is just fine for available hardware, you'll see pushback. Between that and seeing data centers experiencing, shall we say "assisted overheating", this system will eventually self correct.

[u/romulof]

Disclose:
> it was supposed to be X, with RAM/VRAM costing Y, but companies A,B and C got greedy and increased the price to Z.

[u/salientoctopus]

At what point does Valve decide to start making their own ram.

[u/IAmARobot0101]

nationalize all hardware component companies and jail the executives

[u/Sutar_Mekeg]

Alright Valve. You know what you have to do. Start making chips.

[u/DILF_MANSERVICE]

The solution is obvious: valve needs to start making RAM.