GoKawiilIf you've listened to the executives of big tech companies over the last couple of weeks, you wouldn't be wrong in thinking that the second half of 2026 is gonna hurt thanks to the competing demands for the facilities that manufacture components for consumer laptops, smartphones, external storage devices, gaming consoles and more.
"RAMageddon" -- the nom-de-crise attached to the current memory-supply shortage and resulting inflation -- is top-of-mind for everyone, but the shortages we're experiencing are really for anything created in a semiconductor fab. That's because fab resources have, are, or are expected to be reallocated toward whatever's ultimately the most profitable. Right now, that means anything critical to AI -- or anything with AI in the name. And that pressure carries all the way down the supply chain.
Which is why even Apple CEO Tim Cook noted the "availability of advanced nodes our SOCs are produced on" (referring to M- and A-series processors) as one of that company's biggest woes. It's even considering options beyond its long-term supplier, TSMC, to Samsung and Intel fabs. Apple's experiencing real problems, with system configurations disappearing quickly.
Mac Studio models with 128GB memory are one of the many configuration choices that disappeared from the Apple Store. Lori Grunin/CNET
Cook brought up the component crisis during Apple's quarterly earnings call with financial analysts last week. Most of the big tech companies had those calls in the past couple of weeks, and what execs like Cook said paints a bleak picture of how this supply squeeze will affect prices for consumer hardware in the months and years to come.
While buyers of gaming hardware are feeling the crunch now as console and system prices rise, it's likely going to get worse before it gets better. There are three major fabs for memory -- Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron -- and Samsung said it's already sold out its production capacity through the end of 2026. Micron left the consumer RAM business in 2025.
AMD, which supplies the chips in the consoles as well as consumer CPUs and GPUs across the board, said in its call that it expects its gaming revenue to drop by 20% in the second half of the year compared to the first half, and that it's already seen slower desktop sales due to memory and component prices. Microsoft also expects a decline in PC sales thanks to increasing memory costs. For desktops especially, memory price charts looked for a while like the hockey stick typical of fantasy profit forecasts, though they seem to have leveled off for the moment.
Higher prices will mean companies expect to sell fewer products. "Constraints and rising prices around key components like memory, wafers and substrates are driving higher costs that could impact demand for our product at some point in the year," said Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan.
One potential bright spot for computer makers is around business-focused hardware built to run AI tools. "We're making very good progress in the commercial PC arena with our AI PCs," AMD CEO Lisa Su said.
How are companies responding to higher prices? Many times, they'll look for other features to catch consumers' eyes. "Looking at actually other parts of technology and computing, it could be size of screen, quality of screen, some of the AI features, but really other things that will drive interest into the category and make up for some of the pressure that we're gonna see from a memory perspective in total," Jason Bonfig, Best Buy's senior executive vice president and chief customer, product and fulfillment officer, said during the company's call in March.
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