The AI boom's appetite for memory chips has reached an unlikely corner of the market: DDR2, the oldest memory standard still in production. According to Tom's Hardware, DDR2 contract prices rose 55% to 60% in the second quarter of the year.
And the climb isn't over. The same report projects prices will rise another 35% to 40% in the third quarter, a sign that the squeeze is intensifying rather than easing.
DDR2 is a generation of computer memory that dates back to the mid-2000s. It has long since been replaced in mainstream PCs by newer, faster standards, but it remains in production for older equipment, industrial systems, and other niche uses that were never updated.
The surge points to how broadly the AI-driven DRAM shortage is being felt. As manufacturers prioritize the high-value memory that powers AI data centers, supply of everything else tightens — including legacy parts that buyers might have assumed were immune to modern market forces.
Why it matters: when a chip shortage driven by cutting-edge AI can drive up the price of memory designed two decades ago, it shows just how far the ripple effects of the AI build-out now reach across the entire technology supply chain.