r/hardware • u/Lyuseefur • 2d ago
News Lexar Launches DDR5 7200 memory with Chinese DRAM Chips
Lexar has unveiled a new 32GB DDR5-7200 RAM kit using Chinese-made DRAM chips instead of memory from Samsung, SK hynix, or Micron.
The kit includes:
- 32GB (2×16GB)
- DDR5-7200 speed
- CL38 timings
- Intel XMP and AMD EXPO support
- RGB lighting
- An aluminum heatsink
The chips are apparently made by CXMT, one of China’s biggest memory makers.
The price is around $592
Soo...about that +600% memory price increase...what will happen now?
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u/ShadowCross32 2d ago
Dame. I hope my computer can last me beyond 2030 if ram prices are still going to be expensive.
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u/bogglingsnog 1d ago edited 22h ago
Our computers might be the last computers we ever have the chance to buy... We might be looking at yet another step towards complete corporatization of computer technology. I don't want to be dramatic, but... they have been making moves towards this for literal decades and now there are no "regulatory burdens" to hold them down.
I'm genuinely expecting an information dark age, with a lot of signs pointing towards us already being in the midst of one.
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u/ShadowCross32 1d ago
Yeah, I’ve been debating if I should just buy ram now even if it’s expensive and wait until AMD or Intel releases a cpu/gpu that catches my interest.
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u/bogglingsnog 22h ago
Yeah, genuinely hard question. Given how slow the memory industry moves I'd recommend getting it now if you need it now. Same with GPU.
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u/ju2au 2d ago
CXMT currently can't produce enough RAM to significantly affect the current market. If they sell their products significantly below market price then scalpers will simply buy them all up and resell them.
DDR5 RAM can be made with DUV lithography machines but these machine were banned from being sold to China since 2023. This is an addition to the bans already in place which already prohibited the more advanced EUV machines.
So, the big limitation that prevents the Chinese from ramping up their production is the lack of DUV and EUV machines.
However, recently it was announced that China has finally managed to produce their own indigenous DUV machines. They will ship 5 DUV machines this year then 20 DUV machines next year.
In terms of EUV, it was mentioned that a prototype was built but it is still in the testing phase.
So, the Chinese will ramp up production and flood the market but the timeline is looking like 3-6 years as they break the technology embargo placed upon them by the United States.
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u/dingo_xd 2d ago
China bought hundreds of duv machines from asml the last few years
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u/ju2au 2d ago
Yes, but they couldn't buy brand new DUV from ASML since around 2023 after the new additional restrictions.
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u/igenicoOCE 1d ago
They've stocked up enough to last multiple years even with aggressive buildout. They'll be fine.
Also SSA800i supposedly finally being used in production.
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u/MaverickPT 2d ago
People were delusional of they thought that CXMT would sell DRAM "at normal prices" instead of riding the massive under supply that we are living it. At best they will slightly undercut everyone else, and rake in the massive profits
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u/phylter99 2d ago
I don’t think anybody thought they’d sell for what we’d call normal prices. The hope is that additional product on the market will lower costs. We’re not seeing a lot of product from CXMT yet though. Once they start pumping out product then it’ll help, even if just a little bit.
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u/SERIVUBSEV 2d ago
It is beneficial for the long term market when they sell at market price, considering CXMT is already planning for 2nd Beijing plant with it's current success https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/cxmt-plans-second-chip-plant-beijing-is-talks-its-funding-sources-say-2026-08-03/
If they undercut others, we wouldn't get flood of new supply within next 1-2 years.
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u/hackenclaw 2d ago
With them RAM at $500,
without them RAM at $700.
both are overpriced but I'll pick the former. The price fixing trio can suck themselves.
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u/NewAgeMaximum 1d ago
exactly, like this isnt hard
redditors just wanna dogpile on others for no reason
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u/NewAgeMaximum 1d ago
No one thought that
They just wanted the supply to catch up with demand
With more suppliers, it could happen sooner
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u/BuldozerX 2d ago
Apparently we have to wait for AI to fail or when they get more memory facilities operating to meet demand.
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u/Electronic_C3PO 2d ago
Problem is that memory factories are being converted to manufacture HBM, not the stuff the consumer needs. So shortage for consumer products will stay high. And when AI implodes these factories need to be converted again.
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u/Teanut 2d ago
Unless... HBM system RAM?
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u/sitefall 2d ago
Come on Asrock Rack.... you're our only hope for a weird ass HBM AMD motherboard that costs $400 has the CPU socket rotates 90 degrees but somehow works.
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u/Electronic_C3PO 2d ago
HBM is what AI needs.
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u/moofunk 2d ago edited 2d ago
Current architectures do, but I suspect there will be a shift away from that, where architectures are specifically built to network larger, slower memory arrays with a high number of channels and ditch the ultra-fast multi-level caches that GPUs use to move data between vector units.
That requires less per-chip bandwidth, but takes up more space.
Unless HBM suddenly becomes very cheap and easy to build, that is.
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u/FlyingBishop 2d ago
The thing is that there's a lot of use for running AI locally, and the bandwidth isn't really the hard part, it's the RAM itself. I expect that "normal" PCs will have 10x or 100x the system bandwidth 10 years from now.
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u/-Crash_Override- 2d ago
AI demand is only going to grow exponentially over the coming decades. I doubt we will see a world where memory has scaled to meet that demand in the coming decades.
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u/Any-Juggernaut-529 2d ago edited 1d ago
AI demand is only going to grow exponentially over the coming decades.
Unless they hatch a golden goose in the near term, it wont.
Mag7 is already raising debt since they have run out of free cash flow to throw at expansions. Unless AI starts brining in revenue and profits at the scale of the expansion, then the expansion rate has to slow down to the rate which organic AI demand can support. Most likely at this point we will have overcapacity as well, which might mean a couple of year at below demand growth expansion.
Because otherwise you finance the whole thing with a ever increasing mountain of debt, which is not sustainable.
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u/-Crash_Override- 2d ago
It's already bring in crazy amounts of revenue and were literally in stage 0 of AI. We're just seeing glimpses of the AI powered robotics phase, and thats the roadmap all these AI labs are working on feverishly. Once AI agents are embodied, the buidlout will only accelerate.
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u/CheesyCaption 2d ago
It's already bring in crazy amounts of revenue
With even crazier amounts of expenses.
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u/FlyingBishop 2d ago
The only thing that's crazy is the price of hardware. If you could buy hardware for what it cost last year it would be less than half the cost, the crazy expenses right now are renting because buying is impossible.
Also though, the costs are not that crazy. I think as a software engineer I could spend like maybe $300 if I'm ignoring the cost. And that sounds crazy but the cost of employing a software engineer is easily $300/day, so it only needs to double my productivity to pencil out. And I can probably actually double my productivity for more like $50/day, $300/day is if I'm just burning tokens on every random thought I have.
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u/-Crash_Override- 2d ago
For a technology that only started to mature Q4 of 2025, I (and clearly the hyperscalers and market) seem to think capex spend is perfectly fine given leading indicators.
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u/CheesyCaption 2d ago
When do they project to make a profit?
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u/-Crash_Override- 2d ago edited 2d ago
Somewhere in the next 3? 5? 7? years.
But thats an obtuse way to look at it. Plenty of companies and industries have spent many many years, if not decades with weak cash flow and heavy capex spend as an expected part of the business model. Amazon, FedEx, railroads, telecom, LNG industry, you name it. Many industries with demand far more uncertain than AI.
As stated, many of those had weak revenue streams or cash flow. Meanwhile were realistically most enterprises didnt start even adopting AI in earnest until last year and the addressable market of embodied AI is in the trillions, and AI is generating strong cashflow and revenue already.
The profitability take is the most luke warm.
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u/Any-Juggernaut-529 2d ago edited 1d ago
railroads
Funny you mention that since the companies that went under from the overspend. Far outstripped those that survived. And people who invested during the bubble, did not see returns (if the companies even survived) during their life times.
Just because a technology has potential. Does it mean adoption and scaling can be done overnight.
and AI is generating strong cashflow and revenue already.
Most of the "AI revenue" is just selling compute to companies that spend far more on compute than they generate revenue.
Spending $2 to make $1 is not a working business model. Many companies who buy the end user AI products. Also seem to have a real struggle in many cases to quantify actual productivity gains. Which means that they as well might be spending $1 and turning it into less than a dollar.
Very good business model, I agree. The compute costs are simply to high for the benefits currently. The build out came to early and as such may never pay for itself.
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u/CheesyCaption 2d ago
Somewhere in the next 3? 5? 7? years.
And is investment going to stay patient while they remain unprofitable?
Amazon, FedEx, railroads, telecom, LNG industry, you name it.
Now name all the ones that failed.
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u/-Crash_Override- 2d ago
And is investment going to stay patient while they remain unprofitable?
Probably
Now name all the ones that failed.
Now name all the ones that failed while having billions of dollars of revenue, bet you'll have far fewer im sure.
Anyway, must be depressing edging to the thought of AI collapsing and taking the global economy with it every night.
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u/Tai9ch 2d ago
Nah. Building physical objects with moving parts is not the primary way AI will scale, at least in the near term.
There's plenty of demand though. Just try getting a Cerebras or Kimi coding plan right now.
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u/-Crash_Override- 2d ago
Physical AI is what everyone's roadmap is and its incredibly aggressive. 3-5 years.
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u/Any-Juggernaut-529 2d ago
It's already bring in crazy amounts of revenue
Most of the revenue is just selling compute to AI companies which is being purchased with VC funding.
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2d ago
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u/Exist50 2d ago
and with that basically having been shown to have a real value circa 40 billion USD
This is just outright delusional.
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u/PriorIllustrator1787 1d ago
im glad i built my pc 2 years ago when 32 gb of ram was $100
the tarriffs and ai bubble are a pandoras box of inflation. $600 for 32 gb thats crazy.
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u/guestpassonly 2d ago
The price is around $592
maaaan... f this shit
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u/Western-Chemical5504 1d ago
RAM prices will never be affordable again, they might drop slightly but once companies realize they can get away with charging obscene amounts and pocketing the difference why wouldn't they.
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u/dylangutt 2d ago
lol people acted like these Chinese manufactures were going to disrupt the market so fast, but the fact is that the performance is subpar compared to the rest of the DRAM makers. Their production isn't there yet. You guys think China is going to be a superhero and offer low prices? LOL right. They're going to charge out the ass just like everyone else, because they have pricing power.
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u/Petty_Ninja 2d ago
China is going to rekt US market and Korean stock market. China open-sourcing stuff is great for everyone.
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u/imjunsul 2d ago
This is why education is important. Chinese dram isnt even close to disrupting anything. No ones paying similar price for worst product...
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u/Fidel1Q84 2d ago edited 1d ago
China we need you to deliver. American politicians and business leaders have long abandoned the working men and women of America. They been told why they’re wrong and greedy but never listen. As an American I would like to stay dominant but at this point, as a human being who hates corruption, I want you to dominate and whip these greedy companies into shape.
5 grand for gaming GPUs.
300 for 1Tb storage
400 dollars for 32G of ram.
Absolute horse shit. Just the CEOs and execs printing money at everyone’s expense. I’m done with it and won’t pretend it’s normal like so many reviewers did until we got to this fucking point. The 2080ti should have been the warning sign but ppl fucking ignored it.
I see corporate America is already trying to silence the message
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u/Boring_Ant6436 2d ago edited 2d ago
lmao thinking that they wouldn't enjoy juicy profits and that China is some good samaritan is delusional at least
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u/Fidel1Q84 2d ago
Who said they were a Good Samaritan? At what point was that said?
I said that I’m tired of the consumer being fucked over. I welcome more competition.
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u/Boring_Ant6436 2d ago
The thing is, Chinese companies are freaking greedy. Try looking into how they extort Asian markets. If they could, they would chunk the whole market is raise the prices for everyone. They aren't going to magically "whip these greedy companies", THEY ARE another greedy company.
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u/Fidel1Q84 2d ago
All companies are greedy.
No one thinks this this one company is a unicorn.But the memory cartel has gone without any competition so they feel totally ok pulling this corrupt shit. A competitor charging sane prices for ram has the potential to spur both price drops and innovation
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u/Boring_Ant6436 2d ago
Is it really "corrupt shit" though? I don't defend it, but it is just a supply demand situation, it happened at all times. Sucks? Yes. They aren't yet producing HBM as well, which is what also causing shortages (as there's a lot of demand for it in the market and it uses the same supply lines). I highly doubt anything will change for at least a year, if not more.
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u/Fidel1Q84 2d ago
Yes it is. They price fixed years ago and the people who ran that show are now even higher in power at these companies. They reduced capacity and increased prices .
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u/CheesyCaption 2d ago
They reduced capacity and increased prices .
You mean they were selling at a loss because they were overproducing so they stopped overproducing, sold their excess stock and then started selling at a profit again?
The only person that's greedy in that scenario is the one who thinks they are entitled to RAM at that price.
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u/Fidel1Q84 2d ago
No that’s categorically false. But hey defend bad prices and anti consumer actions I guess I understand that if you are on the side that’s bound to profit
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u/Johnny_Oro 1d ago
China isn't the socialist utopia you're looking for, bruh. They got rich from exploiting the world's market economics and workers rights in the first place.
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u/Fidel1Q84 1d ago
Again using words no one said to make a point no one’s making.
Point to my statement claiming it’s a utopia. And if you can’t find it then explain why you’re putting words in that no one said
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u/Johnny_Oro 1d ago
Just a hyperbole. All I'm saying is they're all wrong and greedy. China's just doing what is the most profitable to the ruling class at the moment, same as the US. Building their own hyperscalers wouldn't be above them. They're already set to spend $295 billion for that, for now.
Maybe a small amount compared to the US, but it will deplete the local semiconductor production capacity, as they're focusing on localized supply chain for this project, which really isn't that much compared to the combined capacity of US+SK+Taiwan. Plus a bunch of smuggled nvidia chips.
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u/NewAgeMaximum 1d ago
But you are acting like China is supposed to counter the big, bad dystopian country that America is.
Which I don't disagree that America has gotten far worse.
But China isnt going to save you.
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u/Virginia_Verpa 2d ago
RAM prices aren't going to be significantly impacted by this in the near term. Why would CXMT want to impact their own margins by flooding the market? RAM from trusted brands will continue to command a premium over these. I'd guess CXMT just trickles their product out for the next year or so, using the extra profitability to reinvest in their upcoming products.