Did you really just ask that?
The RAM crisis and the PC apocalypse
- Thread starter F. King Daniel
- Start date
Did you really just ask that?
Depends on who you're watching, some are actually honest and state that apart from special needs you don't need more than 32GB of RAM for example.
The problem is that most of them are sponsored, so they don't think about pricing as much and can easily install a 5090 in every system they build because the sponsor pays for them. However i have seen enough who build several classes, i.e. low to mid tier systems and they give valid suggestions what to get.
Then again when you are thinking about getting a new system the first question is always asking what it needs to do and on which level. Don't own a 4k capable monitor then why pay for a high end, 4K capable system?
For example i play mostly strategy games and if possible turn based as i've gotten too old to play fast paced shooters anymore, so my system requirements are around mid tier. Occasionally i do play action games but then again i don't really need constant 100+ FPS at max resolution, so a good mid tier system will fill 90% of my needs.
If people would just run from this basic assumption they could save a ton of money for the most part by avoiding all the marketing and chasing FPS and other buzzwords you always hear from these influencers.
However even with these moderate requirements i still now have to invest a couple of hundred extra than i would have to 6 months ago and it will only get worse. Time to dig into all those unplayed or half finished older games in my Steam library i guess.
Likely myself too. If I'm gaming, most of the newer games I want to play lean towards CRPG, though there are some action games I've got that I need to try. There are some upcoming games that I'll likely want to play that will require more than what I've got - but unlikely to need masses of Ram and the super pricy (here at least) graphics cards
I'm mostly a 1080p player so that alleviates some of the heavy lifting
I'm mostly a 1080p player so that alleviates some of the heavy lifting
Building a PC is going to be more difficult.
And now, I'm in the market for at 12TB external drive to backup my NAS, and I'm not liking the prices that I'm seeing.
arstechnica.com
And now, I'm in the market for at 12TB external drive to backup my NAS, and I'm not liking the prices that I'm seeing.
RAM shortage chaos expands to GPUs, high-capacity SSDs, and even hard drives
GPU makers may prioritize more profitable models; large SSDs are harder to find.
arstechnica.com
I do all of my gaming at 1080p.
I think, we are years out before 4K becomes affordable and energy efficient.
not just ram though vram is just as important if not more so.
the latest and greatest games are requiring more and more VRAM to load all the game related stuff.
It's one of the reasons why nVIDIA has taken so much heat over the mid-range 5000 series cards and the Battlemage series from Intel have been praised (with AMD in the middle).
While not quite on part with the nVIDIA cards for overall performance, the B series cards have brought 12 and 16GB of VRAM to the table which is big benefit and a price that don't require the sacrifice of a kidney or first born.
1440p gaming is becoming more popular - you can get a lot of detail and quality without needing the sort hardware to run 4K.
There's also been rumours (and denials) swirling that nVIDIA is canning some of the mid-range cards to free up the memory so it can be used on higher end cards.
One thing that may be a benefit in all this is that it may force game developers to start optimizing their games again if this crisis persists and people hold off on buying the latest hardware because it has gotten so expensive. Since no one knows how long this shortage will last or if the AI bubble bursts at some point things may change fundamentally on the home PC front.
There was a LTT video over the weekend and that was one of the points made - in part because it's also forcing delays with the next generation of consoles.
dad was a mainframe programmer in the mid 70s and once said there's nothing like a small amount of memory to enforce writing tight code.
I think i saw the video too and others, it is the consensus that developers have kind of lost this skill or rather didn't use it anymore because they could rely on cheap ressources to make up for it and save time in the development process. That is now changing and i think the first time in a year or two a publisher releases a major game completely un or badly optimized they'll get a bloody nose and others will notice.
One can only hope this leads to something good and ends the insane FPS race, seriously, who needs anything beyond 60-100 FPS? Maybe i'm blind at my "old" age but i usually don't see much difference past a certain point.
There is a point where FPS doesn't make much of a difference at all for casual gaming beyond a certain point.
That's true, and if you're playing at 1080p, I think the question of FPS kind of becomes irrelevant, unless the game in question is unoptimized enough to even have issues there. There are certain types of game, where it doesn't matter at all. It seems to me it's mostly been the first-person-shooter crowd that have been always concerned about FPS, and even moreso when you consider the pro-gamers who do it competitively, but again that's a very niche group, and then it circles back to influencers.
The only first-person-shooter that I play is Mechwarrior Online, and then, it's only casual game play. And my FPS feels less important at my resolution than my latency.
I don't really play first person shooters anymore aside from maybe the odd one here and there depending on my mood. Most of them are the slower-paced that are really RPGs that involve exploration, like the Fallouts and Outer Worlds. I've always found it curious when I hear players say modern first person shooters are slow, because if anything they're faster. Older first person shooters always were more methodical.
More apocalyptic A.I. doom and gloom news! Intel will make less desktop CPU's!
www.techpowerup.com
Intel Reallocates PC Production Capacity to Server CPUs Amid Tight Wafer Supply
Yesterday, after the equity market closed, Intel announced its Q4 and full-year 2025 earnings, along with weaker-than-expected guidance for Q1 2026. As a result, Intel's stock is anticipated to open 11% lower today. During the Q4 earnings call, Intel's CFO, David Zinsner, explained the reasons...
/* AMD rubs hands in glee */More apocalyptic A.I. doom and gloom news! Intel will make less desktop CPU's!
Intel Reallocates PC Production Capacity to Server CPUs Amid Tight Wafer Supply
Yesterday, after the equity market closed, Intel announced its Q4 and full-year 2025 earnings, along with weaker-than-expected guidance for Q1 2026. As a result, Intel's stock is anticipated to open 11% lower today. During the Q4 earnings call, Intel's CFO, David Zinsner, explained the reasons...
/* ARM manufacturers wonders if they get could lucky */
They won't build much extra capacity, you see, when the bubble burst you do NOT want to have an excess of capacity because then prices and margins will come down, it's much better to screw everyone over as much as possible and sell stuff at inflated prices. 
@Marc
AMD rubbing its hands in glee yes, but screw the normal customer, they're foundry less so have to buy capacity from TSMC etc, you really think that's going into consumer processors with far lower margins than server CPU's?
Why do you think they're pondering about making a few more "new" AM4 CPU's? Those don't use the high end fabs with the newest nodes, its better to have people upgrade their AM4 machines with some "new" CPU's for that socket, most users will only need to update their BIOS, they already have the rest..
@Marc
AMD rubbing its hands in glee yes, but screw the normal customer, they're foundry less so have to buy capacity from TSMC etc, you really think that's going into consumer processors with far lower margins than server CPU's?
Why do you think they're pondering about making a few more "new" AM4 CPU's? Those don't use the high end fabs with the newest nodes, its better to have people upgrade their AM4 machines with some "new" CPU's for that socket, most users will only need to update their BIOS, they already have the rest..
China is happy..... They make ram chips but they're usually shitty. But found one video with a real human and not an AI voice thank you Gamers Nexus
Ah I said shitty
Ah I said shitty
I always run memtest for all the RAM I buy and let it run a couple of days.
memtest.org
Memtest86+ | The Open-Source Memory Testing Tool
Memtest86+ is an advanced, free, open-source, stand-alone memory tester for 32- and 64-bit computers (UEFI & BIOS supported)
memtest.org