With DDR5 prices quadrupling as AI demand drains supply, we tested CXMT Chinese RAM to see how it stacks up against premium and budget kits in gaming.
DDR5 Prices Are Broken, So We Tested Cheaper Chinese RAM
- Thread starter Steve
- Start date
themastergoose
Posts: 268 +859
CXMT realises their NAND is extremely valuable, so prices it exactly like any for profit business would. IMO, you've also unnecessarily overstated the temperature "issue".
In other news, rain is wet, the desert is dry...
In other news, rain is wet, the desert is dry...
Lowhangingfruit
Posts: 113 +247
This is helpful. A lot of these no-name RAMs floating around ebay. Good to know they're decent.
What do we know about long term reliability?
What do we know about long term reliability?
dangh
Posts: 1,838 +2,893
Now, when they get more visibility, they might scale up production to provide alternative in a larger quantity, for a better price. And after this madness ends, they will have the market position to continue delivering their memory, and we as users will get more choices.
Megalomaniac
Posts: 1,157 +1,224
I recently bought a brand new top-spec machine. I will not buy another for the next 10 years (that's how long it was since I bought the last one). Hopefully things will be better then. I'll be retired.
Sadly they're not the saviours we were hoping they were as they are still pretty expensive.
I have Gloway RAM with SKHynix chips. I hope that CXMT increase NAND production so that we get cheaper RAM and SSD's.
I don't know what the temperatures are of my RAM chips but sadly I can't place a cooler on top of them due to my Phanteks T6 cooler (fantastic cooler and only a little hotter than the NH-D15 for a third of the price.).
I have Gloway RAM with SKHynix chips. I hope that CXMT increase NAND production so that we get cheaper RAM and SSD's.
I don't know what the temperatures are of my RAM chips but sadly I can't place a cooler on top of them due to my Phanteks T6 cooler (fantastic cooler and only a little hotter than the NH-D15 for a third of the price.).
seeprime
Posts: 1,211 +1,877
Melkor Unlimited
Posts: 383 +354
If there is a lot of desperate buyers to pay unreasonably high prices, they wont sell them cheap.
Or maybe it was retailers who raised the price...
All CXMT needs to do is ramp up production and keep the prices low and they'll easierlly eat into the market share of it's rivals, especially if the price hike continues for some time.
I have a feeling that the real winner in this game is going to be CXMT whiles the real loser is going to be Micron over the long run for pulling out of the consumer market as you can't just pull out of the market and think they can jump back in once the AI market calms down, it doesn't work that way and they've likely always lost a lot of that market share to rivals, something CXMT should capitalise on.
If they can ramp up production quickly enough, they could quickly become a major player if the rivals keep stocks low for consumers as well as prices high.
I have a feeling that the real winner in this game is going to be CXMT whiles the real loser is going to be Micron over the long run for pulling out of the consumer market as you can't just pull out of the market and think they can jump back in once the AI market calms down, it doesn't work that way and they've likely always lost a lot of that market share to rivals, something CXMT should capitalise on.
If they can ramp up production quickly enough, they could quickly become a major player if the rivals keep stocks low for consumers as well as prices high.
daffy duck
Posts: 1,124 +1,034
I got Corsair Dominator 6000 CL36 2x48GB for only $900 two weeks ago in Australia, so pretty happy, as some shops wanted $2000, one even wanted $3400. Good to see for even CL36 makes almost no difference to gaming performance t 1440p or higher on 9700X. v-cache makes timing largely irrelevant, so 9800X3D performance varies very little with latency.
Robertrogue
Posts: 127 +81
What this really does is move the needle towards wider competition. After the AI bubble pops. Ah and it will pop, like a cheap piece of Fortune Bubble. 2028 will be a great year for building a new system. At some point the big three monopoly companies need to be shown they are too big for their " los pantalones". I am excited to see that the manufacturers are going to eventually cause consumers to seek out their competition for cost savings, if that is the real issue. I am very cost conscious and will go without a computer before I spend my hard earned money on overpriced parts, I have needed a GPU for five years, still using a GTX580 and it is not cutting it on games, but it is something and I am keeping the $1000 in my account. We will see..........
bclaymiles
Posts: 464 +408
I watched the video on youtube last night before seeing the article this morning. Last night I went to the Kingbank site - and while it wasn't exhaustive, every stick of DDR5 listed there said 'SK-Hynix memory'.
I didn't spend much time on the CXMT site, but it's entirely geared toward manufacturers, so there's no 'where to buy' or anything like that. So, based on 7% market share, and now the video and article, I'm going to assume that in short order, every stick will be 'out of stock', and when they do show up the prices will be exactly the same as G.Skill or Corsair, or any of the 'big' manufacturers.
A damn shame. I'm paranoid enough I may yet wind up doing my new PC build, just gritting my teeth as I spend thousands more than I would have last year.
I didn't spend much time on the CXMT site, but it's entirely geared toward manufacturers, so there's no 'where to buy' or anything like that. So, based on 7% market share, and now the video and article, I'm going to assume that in short order, every stick will be 'out of stock', and when they do show up the prices will be exactly the same as G.Skill or Corsair, or any of the 'big' manufacturers.
A damn shame. I'm paranoid enough I may yet wind up doing my new PC build, just gritting my teeth as I spend thousands more than I would have last year.
This would be a practical article of these chinese brands cost less.
" While JEDEC specifications allow for operation up to 95°, our experience shows that higher-speed DDR5 can run into stability issues above 70"
I have 4 sticks of corsair dominator platinum in my PC. They begin to give errors at or after 65 degrees. 60c is a lot closer to the limit for some brands, especially if 4 slots are populated.
" While JEDEC specifications allow for operation up to 95°, our experience shows that higher-speed DDR5 can run into stability issues above 70"
I have 4 sticks of corsair dominator platinum in my PC. They begin to give errors at or after 65 degrees. 60c is a lot closer to the limit for some brands, especially if 4 slots are populated.
Micro Center has entered the chat.
Also you can use Beat Buy's chat to price match Micro Center
Gars
Posts: 615 +156
You can check https://www.aliexpress.us/ too, probably some good finds
Emu81
Posts: 24 +21
If the memory makers thought that the AI/data center bubble was not going to pop then they would be building out new production capacity for it. Having the capacity to produce RAM for AI/data centres and consumers would make them far more money than just catering to one group at the expense of the other.
For what it is worth, why was the Chinese DDR5 not tested with some memory dependent productivity benchmarks like PassMark, Geekbench, Blender, or Cinebench? Some of us do want to use our PCs for more than just gaming and it would be nice to know if this Chinese DDR5 was good enough for that purpose.
BadThad
Posts: 1,797 +2,051
Great and interesting test, thanks Steven!
The Chinese are taking advantage of all the stolen, reverse-engineered IP and making a competitive product. No shock to me, they've pretty good copiers and they probably were able to hire some ex-Samsung employees.
Let us not get too excited. These days, as in the past, memory performance is boring. The time savings between the best and the worst performers matters not in real life. With RAM, capacity matters the most.
My concern is that only one platform was tested. The big issue with ALL memory is compatibility. The real test comes when it will run on 20 different motherboards across varying AMD and Intel platforms without failing to POST or bluescreening.
Are the PCB, surrounding chips and soldiering garbage? Will this RAM degrade faster over time?
The Chinese are taking advantage of all the stolen, reverse-engineered IP and making a competitive product. No shock to me, they've pretty good copiers and they probably were able to hire some ex-Samsung employees.
Let us not get too excited. These days, as in the past, memory performance is boring. The time savings between the best and the worst performers matters not in real life. With RAM, capacity matters the most.
My concern is that only one platform was tested. The big issue with ALL memory is compatibility. The real test comes when it will run on 20 different motherboards across varying AMD and Intel platforms without failing to POST or bluescreening.
Are the PCB, surrounding chips and soldiering garbage? Will this RAM degrade faster over time?
BadThad
Posts: 1,797 +2,051
Exactly what I built 4 years ago, I tried to future-proof and it's worked brilliantly. I have no desire to upgrade and I may be dead before I need to at my age. lol
Thing is, Micron and whoever else can and will totally come back and ppl will snap it up, especially the longer any drought runs for. You might underestimate the PC gaming and trending projects crowd here (with anybody buying for productivity we can assume making money from their HW to invest back into it) It's not like we haven't seen much like this before, with Nvidia's totally intentional plays and tricks in the last 5 years or so.
The RAM giants may be back with supply at some point but the prices we did have before won't be quite the same again. Why would they be when if some ppl will pay over the odds for what RAM is available, well... they all can and will. They just need to be starved long enough.
And like Nvidia's example ppl will be just too happy for things to be righted somewhat to hold any grudge they may declare in the interim.
Me... I'm hoping CXMT (not entirely unlike AMD's RDNA 2/3 in this case) and their ilk get well ahead over this cos another player to keep the others a little bit more honest is never a bad thing. But yeah, it'll still be a good long while before I can even justify affording what they have to offer rn.
BadThad
Posts: 1,797 +2,051
It will, NOTHING in tech lasts period. It's the most dynamic industry on earth. The only question is WHEN will it break? Memory production is running at 110% of capacity and has been. Eventually, GDD5 will fall out of favor. We'll see some data centers close/consolidate, move on to newer tech, go out of business, etc. and those millions of modules will hit the market like a tidal wave. There is also a high probably that some mega-horders/scalpers/corp buyers over-bought and could be stuck holding the bag evenutally as demand wanes. That inventory will have to go, it's a liability. Time is the greatest driver of tech attrition on earth.
I'm still waiting for this funny thing to happen! You buy a budget PC for $600, take out the RAM, sell it for $600 and keep a free PC. That kinda thing has happened a lot in the past, especially during the video card fiasco! hahahahaha
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