From : https://techhub.social/@sawaba@infosec.exchange/115924627853343043 (mastodon)
The enshittification of computer repair is happening.
AI has amazingly managed to make repairable computers practically worthless.
The increase in memory and storage pricing is destroying the second-hand market for computing hardware and this makes me sad. I watched a video from someone that runs a repair shop, and this is what’s happening:
The memory/storage alone is worth more than the rest of the computer, so people are stripping them out to sell separately.
The second hand market is now flooded with computers that have no memory or storage. Buying new memory or storage to put in these used computers is now more expensive than buying a new computer.
So we now suddenly have a giant e-waste problem PLUS a giant problem for repair shops that want to stay in business.
In the video, he was basically saying that they have to pivot to the only computers that folks aren’t stripping RAM and storage out of - computers that have those things soldered on. The irony here is that repair shops now have to ignore the most repairable computers and focus on the least repairable computers instead.
This is not enshittification. This is supply and demand like it’s always been played out with far more demand than there is supply, and no real good supply relief in the foreseeable future. Gonna get way worse as people scalp/panic buy in bulk.
I have a hard time calling this enshittification, it dilutes term if it is just used to mean anything getting worse. Rather it should be used to describe the purposeful corporate destruction of a service’s value to boost profit after attracting users.
Ai is the machine powering turbo-enshittification of other products.
I don’t know if it is purposeful. It just seems to be a side effect of the market going all in on AI.
Seems like a good time to collect some free computers and then after the inevitable AI collapse, you can get free RAM, and boom, free computers for everyone.
Except the RAM that’s getting made for AI bullshit isn’t regular DDR5 sticks. It’s useless in a regular PC.
Fair point
I don’t get it, the PCs that still run DDR4 aren’t as affected (even some new still throw 13th &14th Gen Intel CPUs). Plus DDR4 had been out nearly a decade, so demand shouldn’t be so crazy as it’s everywhere. So if it’s a used market, pricing shouldn’t be so terrible. I haven’t been on eBay too check those prices, but I’m talking new stuff as I still have many desktops I still buy RAM for. Sure it’s higher, but not awful like the 32GB DDR5 i bought for work for $260 lol.
Btw I’ve already informed my bosses that I’m going to completely blow my tech budget this year bc of this stupid bullshit if we do a typical upgrade cycle. We switched to every 6 years vs 4-5. Glad I spent a bunch of RAM & SSDs, last spring! 32GB DDR5 RAM for $90 is now $380 lol
DDR4 has gone up almost 100% since October. Since there are still plenty of boards that use DDR4, when DDR5 got pinched, everyone rushed to shore up their exiting DDR4 systems. Also as another poster said there are still new boards being sold with DDR4 support. It’s cascading.
Yes, I’ve got some new systems that still run DDR4 as they’re sold with 13th Gen Intel CPUs. But if I buy ddr4 yeah it’s up about 2x vs 5x ddr5
DDR4 aren’t as affected
It is still very affected. That’s what the video is about.
Yes, still affected, just not as affected. I’ve seen 50-100% rise vs DDR5 which is 300-500% rise. Like I also said, a lot of ddr4 existed before the hike so the supply shouldn’t have been as strained like brand new ddr5
It’s affected enough to cause a problem where the RAM is worth more than the entire rest of the device. New RAM and old RAM comprise the same total supply. Do you get it now?
DDR4 was still popular and being made. Flash chip shortage is a specific part shared amongst all RAM and SSDs so it’s causing a shortage on all of them.
there has got to be a stick leve that is cheap. I mean does it go down to 4gig sticks? I would think then you could make low ram high cpu laptops real cheap which actually I might have to look around for.
The price of DDR4 has gone up enough that I’m no longer considering upgrading my 2017 daily driver laptop to 32GB.
same here, I’ve wanted to buy a second 32GB stick for my laptop, but now it costs about the same as a months rent for my collage dorm. My broke ass can’t afford that and still eat, so I’m gonna have to rock single channel for a couple of years more.
awful like the 32GB DDR5 I bought for work for $260 lol
Check this out, this is DDR4
Insane. I bought 2x32GB 6000MHz DDR5 sticks for less than that back in May. Now the same 64GB I bought then for $210 is worth over $800.
I just checked the RAM I bought two years ago for 92€. It is 289€ now, insane!
I bought my ADATA Lancer Blade DDR5 6000 MHz CL30 back in May for 95 eur.
I checked December 6 the prices were around 300 eur. Now I check again and it’s 500 eur. This is so cooked. I heard SSD’s are about to get expensive also. I’m so lucky I did a full upgrade that will last me for a long time, i was even considering whether to upgrade then or wait until winter.
Another casualty in the short sighted quest to make money instead of working honestly. I wonder when pirate ships will start sailing again.
Yes, I have a basement full of computers with no storage. The plan was to put 120 GB SSDs in there and sell them for $40 each. 1: That’s no longer possible. 2: nobody wants to buy them for that price.
$40 is now too much for an old but working laptop? That’s crazy
It’s a desktop tower. People are sad when I offer monitor KB and mouse for $20 more.
I’m thinking of bumping up to $50 so people can feel better about talking me down to $35. I don’t like to play games, but people seem to care more about getting a deal than a fair price.
I think the second point was to recoup the costs at least would make them too expensive for people to buy older hardware.
