'This is the first time where I'm seeing no light at the end of the tunnel': How the memory crisis is hitting PC builders

If you care about memory, PC gaming, or technology in general, there's a good chance you've heard of a little 'ol thing called the memory crisis. Thanks to AI gobbling up all the resources, it's the reason why RAM has quadrupled in price recently (if you're lucky). Some big companies may be able to weather that storm by steering into the skid (like Asus, which is betting somewhat on AI) or by having reserves of memory and strong contracts with suppliers. Others seem to be struggling with the day-to-day and are making compromises to navigate.

Jese Martinez, the founder of custom PC company PowerGPU, tells me this crisis is very different to the one that hit GPUs five years ago. When demand for the RTX 20/30 series was already high, cryptominers were buying batches of cards to mine for Ethereum. This led to a surge in pricing, but it was a fairly contained crisis, with it only briefly threatening storage drives and CPUs but never taking hold.

"Now it's not just GPUs," Martinez says, "it's memory, it's storage, it's multiple things that are happening. And it's not just a few 100 bucks. Stuff is going up twice the price or three times the price. I mean, we have 5090s right now selling close to $4,000 / $4,500 on eBay."

Martinez tells me that PowerGPU looked to lower its expenses in response to the crisis by moving to a smaller warehouse. PowerGPU was occupying 10,000 square feet, which Martinez claims was "overkill". The company bought a big supply of memory and storage as the memory crisis started to form, thanks to partnerships with the likes of Kingston and Lexar.

"But that could only last so long, right?"

Martinez says sales dropped in the first quarter of 2026, and though they tend to see sales go back up around the start of the tax year (in March), this year was different. I'm told customers simply "don't want to pay the price" of memory right now.

Martinez admits, "We're pretty much in survival mode."

Wallace Santos, the CEO of gaming PC builder Maingear, claims the memory crisis is very different to standard crises they've tackled before: "In the two plus decades I've been doing this, this is the first time where I'm seeing no light at the end of the tunnel, at least for the next two years. It's not a multi-week problem, it's a multi-year problem that we're facing right now."

Santos' woes are similar to Martinez's. Santos tells me, "In October, we were paying $190 for a kit of RAM. By December, that same kit was costing us $840. As of right now, I think it's 900 plus dollars."

Santos tells me, "I don't think this should be about pointing fingers", but "I don't know who else to point the finger at". In our conversation, fingers were pointed at SK Hynix, Micron, and Crucial. "I get it from a business standpoint, but it's still very painful to the whole ecosystem."

Both companies have had to pass the price increase of memory onto the customers. Maingear tells me that it messages potential buyers, telling them prices are about to go up, and Santos tells me he's worried it will take a long time to go back down.

"I think entry-level PCs, they're going to get greatly affected in the future. I think the $899/$999 price points, those price points probably will shift to $1,599, or $1,499 as an entry-level PC in the future."

Maingear has a program where you can send your own RAM to it when you buy your PC, and they will fit it and tune it for you. You can ship memory directly to it when you buy online, or send it to Maingear with an envelope paid for by the company. It will also RMA your gear if the memory is faulty. Or you can just fit it at home. Santos tells me they are hopeful that competitors will copy this plan "so we can remove some strain from the supply chain."

Michael Jin, senior product designer at tiny PC maker Minisforum, tells me, "the current memory supply situation is cyclical and temporary", and that "we expect it to stabilise as production capacity adjusts and demand normalises."

It's true that no crisis can last forever. Eventually, either manufacturers meet demand or those making demands no longer need such a large supply. That doesn't mean it will end soon, though.

Both Maingear and Minisforum argue now is the right time to upgrade. Minisforum says, "Given that memory prices may remain high for some time, we encourage users considering an upgrade to make their purchase sooner rather than later."

"If you can afford to do it. Do it," Santos says. "Don't wait till tomorrow to build a PC… There's no guarantees tomorrow."

"Prices will keep going higher. And it sounds ridiculous. Me saying that, coming from my position… people think we're being opportunistic. It's that I'm just keeping it real."

PowerGPU's perspective is different. "For $1,000, your best bet is to do some research, build it yourself. If you can't, or if you don't want to—and it depends on what you're trying to accomplish—honestly, I recommend a console at that point"

Later during the same week I spoke to Martinez, Sony raised the price of the PS5 by $100 and the PS5 Pro by $150.

But where does that leave the builders? Where Minisforum sees smaller builders leveraging their position in the market to offer different kinds of builds to the biggest companies, Maingear argues, "I think there will be some companies that will dissipate into the sunset. That's the reality of it."

But AI, the technology gobbling all that memory, is not seen unfavourably by anyone I've spoken to. Santos tells me that "we should also understand that there is a need for AI," and "I think at the end of the day, it is, it is a culture-changing, life-changing technology that's going to catapult, you know, our species, right? But it's painful."

Martinez is still hopeful about the memory crisis. He says he hopes it's over as soon as possible.

"I would hope that it's sooner rather than later, but I really hope it's over by summer… by, like, towards the end of the year. That's my assumption."

Analysts are less hopeful. Counterpoint research reckons "there is no scenario where memory prices correct in the second half" of 2027. Micron has also confirmed demand is "significantly in excess of our available supply for the foreseeable future".

And this leaves the PC market in a weird spot. Santos believes the memory crisis gives the opportunity for companies "to rent compute to people", and he argues big companies are not "incentivising people to have computers at home". NZXT and HP are both renting PCs to users, which is one way to not actually have to sell memory it owns.

"Is that the future? I don't know. I hope not. I think as a community, as an enthusiast community, we were stronger than that, and we tend to make a lot of noise," Santos says.

Whether or not that noise will make any difference in the wider gaming market is anyone's guess, but one thing is clear: While AI companies rake in up to trillions of dollars of value, everyone is paying for it.