Why do ram prices differ so greatly?

[mrdiddlebot]

Hey, I just had a quick question about why some ram kits, of the same speed and capacity, differ in price so greatly. Some are $500+ and some are under $200. Is this like the difference between m.2 drives that use nvme v.s sata or is it something else? 

 

Edit: I have checked the capacity, frequency, timings, voltage, etc on most of the parts I'm confused about and the price disparity still doesn't make sense. 

[goto10]

some ram modules could be a kit composed of 4 modules

 

other kits could be low latency, cl14 for example, others could be cl16 or cl18 or even higher

 

other could be ram with rgb lights, to give lots of bling to the pc

 

other kits could be just seller trying to get every penny from you, like those sellers selling a 100 dollar part at 350 dollars

 

if you give examples of two parts with different prices we could look at them and ser why so big difference

[nick name]

It's usually capacity (sometimes you won't realize a kit is higher capacity or at least I've done it) or it being Samsung b-die that makes a kit more expensive than its comparably spec'd competitor.  So if you see a kit that is 3200CL14 costing more than a 3200CL16 kit then you have to realize that the CL14 kit is probably b-die and its timings are 14-14-14-14 while the other kit is 16-18-18-18.

 

[mrdiddlebot]

Here's a an example of what I'm talking about. These two kits are the same speed same capacity, same timings and the same brand and series. Am I missing something? Or is this like a mistake on newegg's website 

[mrdiddlebot]

Here's an even more dramatic price difference

[Enderman]

Supply and demand.

Some kits have lower timings, it's not just about frequency and capacity.

A more rare bin will have lower stock and therefore higher price.

Also the brand and model affect the price.

[mrdiddlebot]

11 minutes ago, Enderman said:

Supply and demand.

Some kits have lower timings, it's not just about frequency and capacity.

A more rare bin will have lower stock and therefore higher price.

Also the brand and model affect the price.

Those first two kits were identical. Same cl, voltage, everything. I think they might have even had the same part number. I'll never pay more then $200 for a kit of ram anyway, I just wanted to make sure it wasn't some performance spec that I didn't know about. I think newegg just has a bunch of ram that's priced incorrectly. 

[Mister Woof]

Could be that they are third party seller aren't really in stock, so they jack up the price so high nobody buys it, but this way they don't have to redo their listing and can just adjust price back down once it comes back in.

 

Amazon is like this, maybe newegg too?

[Enderman]

1 hour ago, mrdiddlebot said:

Those first two kits were identical. Same cl, voltage, everything. I think they might have even had the same part number. I'll never pay more then $200 for a kit of ram anyway, I just wanted to make sure it wasn't some performance spec that I didn't know about. I think newegg just has a bunch of ram that's priced incorrectly. 

Then they are probably from different sellers.

[paulmohr]

On the two that are identical I looked them up and they are different sellers. The cheaper one is direct from newegg and the more expensive one is from ecmallonline. I checked several examples and the ecmall one is always stupidly high prices. When I shop on newegg I always check the "sold by newegg" box.

 

In the case of that vengence ram that is 700 bucks that isn't from newegg either. That price is really high as well, you can get it right from Corsair for like 460 dollars.

 

In some of the other cases many things can effect it. One being reputation and that you can expect it to actually do what it says or possibly better. Ram, like many other computer parts are tested and binned according to how well they did. The better they test the more money they are going to charge for them. Sort of like buying a standard cpu vs an unlocked cpu, or a special edition model aimed at people that are going to do serious overclocking. As an example they might make a whole run of processors that are 8 cores and they are aiming for a base clock of say 3.5 GHz. Some might test extremely well on all cores and easily run well above 3.5 and take very well to overclocking. These will be the performance models and probably be released at a slightly higher clock, be unlocked and sell for a premium price. Others will hit the mark they were aiming for and be released as the standard model. Others still will suck and not hit the speed the wanted or run well on all the cores. These will end up having cores disabled, set to a lower speed and sold as lower end models. Like they will be the 3.2 GHz 4 core line. Same thing happens with GPUs as well.

 

A name brand company you can trust is probably going to have a higher price than some new company no one has ever heard of. Maybe this new cheap ram will do what it says it will, maybe it won't. Maybe it will work with your motherboard and cpu, and maybe it won't. You see this a lot with SSD's now. You can get some really good prices on SSD's now from some off brand companies. Problem is some don't perform all that well or last as long as the more expensive ones from better known companies. It is kind of gamble, and some would rather pay the extra money then take that gamble.

 

Another thing that could effect the price is if it was tested and verified to work by a motherboard and/or cpu manufacturer. When you buy a motherboard it will have a list of verified supported ram by model number. I would assume the more boards it is verified to work on would make it worth a bit more money vs something that isn't on anyones supported list. Will it work if it isn't listed? Probably, but I would pay an extra 15 bucks or whatever if I knew it worked with my board right off the bat.