AMD predicts DDR5 could hit DDR4 pricing levels by mid-2023
Since launch, DDR5 has been an incredibly expensive part of the PC building puzzle, but AMD believes we could see pricing drop considerably compared with DDR4 into next year and «potentially cross over as we get into the middle of next year,» says David McAfee.
AMD announced its new Ryzen 7000-series processors(opens in new tab) this week, with a whole new AM5 platform built to support both PCIe 5.0 and DDR5. Like most new technology recently, the new memory kits have either been impossible to find, or are hugely expensive, far more so than the established DDR4 modules.
Intel was the first to offer support for the latest memory standard with its Alder Lake CPUs(opens in new tab), but built in backwards compatibility with DDR4 in order to still be able to offer a more affordable way into the platform. That was necessary given the prohibitive pricing, and lack of stock of DDR5 memory modules around Intel's last launch.
AMD, however, isn't giving itself a way out of DDR5 support with its AM5 platform, and is going all-in right from the outset. A year down the line from Intel's Alder Lake launch and that decision's making more sense. For one it means AMD doesn't have to waste resources providing compatibility for an outgoing hardware specification, but also pricing and availability have changed a lot in the past three months or so.
AMD isn't relying on the work Intel has done with its XMP features for DDR5, either. It has been working with memory manufacturers to create a new open standard for overclocking memory profiles, called EXPO(opens in new tab).
«It's clear that DDR5 is the right choice today,» says McAfee at the Ryzen 7000 announcement event in Austin, «and one that is built for the future as the technology
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