It’s a bad time to want a new computer

It’s not exactly surprising that RAMaggeddon is making new tech hardware really expensive. But if you’ve been in the market for things like a new computer or tablet, this week has been filled with sticker shock. Given how many companies announced price hikes related to component shortages, it seems unlikely things will get cheaper any time soon.

Valve started the week off by finally revealing the price of the Steam Machine, its long-delayed, console-like PC that, in our tests, has performance on par with the PS5. It starts at $1,049, nearly double the price of the six-year-old PS5, and that’s for the base configuration with 512GB of storage and without a controller. A bundled controller adds an extra $79, and if you want the 2TB model, you’ll have to tack on another $300. (If you still wanted one soon at that price, well, I hope you entered the lottery.)

Ahead of launch, Valve had warned that the component crisis had forced it to revise its pricing plans. When asked in a recent interview by PC Gamer the one thing he would change about the Steam Machine, Valve engineer Yazan Aldehayyat said: “Make it cheaper.” While the company hasn’t spelled out its initial planned price, it seems like if you shave off $250 or $300 from the current Steam Machine prices, you’ll land in the ballpark of where Valve was originally thinking.

Microsoft introduced some new, cheaper options for its Surface devices this week, though they’re still expensive. The company’s lineup now includes a 12-inch Surface Pro at $849 and a 13-inch Surface Laptop at $949, but they come with a major drawback: Microsoft cut the amount of included RAM in half, dropping it from 16GB to 8GB. Still, they are more affordable than the previous base model versions of those devices, which recently jumped up to $1,049 and $1,199 as part of a batch of Surface price hikes.

And just today, two major companies announced price increases. Apple introduced sweeping price hikes of its own affecting MacBooks, iPads, and even devices like the HomePod and Apple TV. The MacBook Neo, which was a steal at its original $599 price, now starts at $699, for example. (We’ve got a list of all of the new prices right here, and they’re not pretty.) Apple gave Bloomberg a statement on the price hikes, saying they were due to component cost increases at a scale the company has “never seen” because of the data center boom.

Xbox announced higher console prices of $100 or more, meaning the six-year-old Xbox Series S now starts at $499.99 with the price tags only going up from there. In a blog post, Microsoft blamed the component shortage, saying that “console storage and memory prices have increased by more than 2.5x and we expect another doubling by the fall of 2027.”

If you’re looking for a new computer or computing device, whether it’s for gaming, or for school, or whatever you might need it for, the memory and storage shortage means that hardware just costs more now. And with RAM and SSDs still in very short supply — a situation that will likely be the case for a very long time — these higher prices probably aren’t a temporary thing but are instead our new reality. If even Apple, known for its supply chain mastery, has been forced to raise prices, is anyone immune?

The big AI data center buildout is largely to blame. If an individual making a PC at home or a tech company looking for parts for their next product needs components like memory or storage, they’re competing with an AI company or a hyperscaler who might be willing to pay far more for what’s becoming increasingly limited inventory. Valve said as much in an interview published this week; if the company doesn’t take prices as offered, then the suppliers “never talk to us again.”

The competition for parts for data centers is all based on a bet that AI will be a foundational part of how people will use computers and interact with tech in the future. The hyperscalers are racing to build out infrastructure to train their AI models and offer AI-based services for people and businesses. But the lack of supply for components means that buying computers is increasingly more miserable for everyday consumers. Today, everything in tech is more expensive than it was yesterday.

There’s no end in sight: hyperscalers are spending eye-watering amounts of money to build compute capacity so they can shove AI into everything we do. That’s making computers more costly, and it could just be the beginning of what’s to come.