The AI wave is still ongoing, and it is having a profound impact on many industries.
According to media reports, affected by the development of artificial intelligence, the price of the AI chip A800, which is exclusively for the Chinese market, has soared from about 120,000 yuan to 25~300,000 yuan, and even exceeded 500,000 yuan per piece.
Coincidentally, the price of high-performance graphics cards for the consumer market has also risen due to the soaring demand for AI, and the prices of RTX 40 series and 30 series graphics cards from Nvidia have also increased to varying degrees.
After AI chips and high-computing power graphics cards, the next price increase due to AI is SSD (solid-state drive).
SSDs are closely related to the daily lives of mass consumers, including laptops and desktop computers, which use SSDs for data storage. In addition, SSDs are also used in storage products, including portable hard drives.
Why is the price of SSDs skyrocketing due to the development of AI? This starts with the type of hard drive.
Hard disks can be roughly divided into two categories, namely SSDs (solid state drives) and HDDs (mechanical hard drives). The specific differences between the two will be discussed in detail in subsequent articles, and here we only need to know the core difference between the two - velocity.
In contrast to SSDs, which use flash memory chips to store data, which is stored in the form of electronic signals, HDDs use disks to store data, and data is written to the disk through a mechanical mechanism.
Due to the difference in the working principle of the two, the rate of reading data is also very different. Citigroup analyst Peter Lee once pointed out in a report that SSDs are 40 times faster than HDDs.
With the rapid development of AI, AI training will generate a large amount of data, and high-speed data storage will grow into a new rigid demand point.
Some media pointed out that Tesla is continuing to expand the construction of AI servers. Many Silicon Valley giants, including HP and Dell, are also competing to buy enterprise-class SSD products for the purpose of expanding server capacity.
In addition, the demand for ultra-high-capacity SSDs has also been activated recently. Some companies in North America continue to pay attention to 32/64/128TB high-capacity SSD products.
The development of AI has led to the growth of strong market demand, which is the direct cause of the increase in the price of SSDs.
Affected by market demand, many storage giants have competed to adjust the prices of terminal products. According to South Korean media reports, Samsung plans to increase the price of enterprise-class SSD products by 20~25% in the second quarter of this year on the basis of the price in the first quarter, and at the same time plans to increase the production of enterprise-class SSD products.
Another storage giant, Western Digital, also recently sent a letter to its partners that due to the demand for SSD products exceeding expectations, due to the strong demand and the impact of the supply chain, its SSD and even HDD products will usher in price increases.
While the price of enterprise SSDs is rising, there are some new trends in consumer SSDs for the mass market.
According to the media "Nikkei Chinese Network", from the commodity trading price in January ~ March, the price of TLC products with 256GB capacity increased by 12% month-on-month, while the price of TLC products with 512GB capacity increased by 10% month-on-month.
Here you can briefly popularize science, SSD products can be divided into four types: SLC, MLC, TLC, and QLC according to the different flash memory particles used.
SLC and MLC particles have the best performance and high cost, so they are mostly used in high-priced enterprise SSD products.
TLC and QLC particles have moderate performance and low cost, and are mostly used in consumer-grade SSD products at affordable prices. Most of the SSD products we usually see on e-commerce platforms basically use TLC or QLC particles.
To get back to the point, the price of consumer-grade SSDs has risen simultaneously, on the one hand, it is also driven by the price adjustment of enterprise-grade SSDs.
On the other hand, as the capacity of the upstream supply chain is tilted towards enterprise-grade SSDs, there may be a certain degree of shortage of consumer-grade SSD products in a short period of time, which may also lead to price fluctuations.
SSD prices continue to rise, for the masses of consumers are a little worried, should they choose to start at a high level or continue to wait and see?
SSD hard disk is a rigid product with a single function, and its core function is data storage, and it is mainly used for computer installation and memory expansion.
In addition, SSDs and HDD enclosures are now gradually replacing traditional off-the-shelf portable hard drives. That's because SSD enclosures are popular because they have a higher speed cap and can be expanded freely for greater flexibility.
After all, if you need to update your computer hardware urgently, or are facing a shortage of storage space, it's wiser to start with what you need. The current price increase of SSD products is mainly high-priced enterprise level, while the price increase of consumer products is relatively low.
On the other hand, if demand can wait, then you might as well continue to wait and see what happens in the SSD market. With the gradual recovery of production capacity in the upstream supply chain, the price of SSD products is expected to usher in a certain decline in the future, and delayed purchase is a relatively more economical option.
At present, among the three elements of computing power (storage, computing, and network communication), there are already two major elements of related products due to the development of AI prices have ushered in price increases.
What new demand points will emerge in the future, and whether the price of network communication products and services will also be affected by AI?