With hardware hitting high price points in recent times, be it the Xbox Series X, Valve’s Steam Machine, or even Apple’s MacBooks and iPads, Lenovo believes that these trends are permanent and that memory prices might not go back down. As caught by ComputerBase (via VGC), Lenovo executive director Martin Hiegl went as far as to say that DRAM and NAND – components integral to the fabrication of memory and storage – will “never” go back down in price.
However, Hiegl’s use of the word “never” during a talk at ISC 2026 has been reported as being an exaggeration, and the executive was apparently talking about the state of the hardware industry for the next five years.
Recent surges in memory pricing largely come down to the fact that the major companies that make memory, like SK Hynix, Samsung, and Micron, have signed large deals with AI companies to fabricate components and sell directly to them. This has left the rest of the world that relies on computer hardware in the lurch, with even Apple recently having announced a price hike for several of its devices.
Interestingly, just as the memory shortages had started ramping up, Micron had announced that it was pulling out of the consumer market entirely, and essentially shuttered its consumer line-up of storage and memory components sold under the Crucial brand. More recently, Micron’s chief business officer, Sumit Sadana, blamed companies like Apple for the current situation due to their aggressive pricing practices when sourcing components. “A lot of the industry investments got shut down in 2023 because of really poor pricing and really poor margins,” said Sadana.
In the meantime, Microsoft recently announced that its Xbox Series X/S consoles will be getting another price hike. Kicking on from August 1st onwards, the Xbox Series S 512 GB model will be priced at $499.99, compared to its previous $399.99 price tag. The digital version of the Xbox Series X is going up from $599.99 to $749.99, while the disc drive version of the console is going up from $649.99 to $799.99. The Xbox Series X 2TB Galaxy Black is being discontinued entirely.
“The entire consumer electronics industry is struggling with the current components crisis, but the effects are particularly hard on consoles,” said the company when it announced these latest price hikes. “Unlike phones, computers, speakers, and other consumer devices, consoles are typically not sold at a profit, but instead for less than they cost to make.”
In an effort to soften the blow for potential customers, Microsoft is also introducing a “Buy Now, Pay Later” option that gives buyers the ability to purchase an Xbox console and pay it off in interest-free monthly instalments.
Valve recently also admitted to not quite having the bargaining power it needed to negotiate better prices for the Steam Machine’s components. Engineers Pierre-Loup Griffais and Yazan Aldehayyat spoke about how they “would love to be able to make the Steam Machine more affordable and reach more people.” However, they noted that a price drop isn’t likely to happen soon.
Nintendo isn’t immune to these market conditions either, with price hikes hitting the Switch 2 in August.
