Yet again we’re hearing predictions of sizeable price hikes for the SSD market, but this is tempered by the expectation that at least the next round of rising costs won’t be as painful as what we’ve just experienced.
The latest report from analyst firm TrendForce indicates that consumers might end up witnessing price increases of between 10% to 15% in the second quarter of 2024 (which we’ve just entered – how time flies, we know).
That sounds bad – and it isn’t great, obviously – but it does represent a decline in the steepness of price hikes compared to Q1, where SSDs ramped up by 23% to 28% for their price tags.
Consumers are also going to be better off, relatively speaking, than businesses, as in Q2, enterprise SSDs are set for a 20% to 25% hike, which isn’t much better than the 23% to 28% increase seen in Q1 (the same as consumers).
Analysis: To buy soon – or wait?
Note that the rises for Q1 are still estimated, and obviously the Q2 figures are just a forecast of what’ll happen, at least according to TrendForce’s sources and information.
Still, we are now seeing a glimmer of positivity in the consumer SSD arena, in terms of a slowdown in the rate at which price tags are climbing – good news which has been driven by an increase in production by Kioxia and WDC, we’re told. (But other suppliers are expected to remain more conservative in their output going forward, TrendForce notes).
Is this a hopeful sign that maybe as we go into Q3, we might be over the worst of all this? We’ll tentatively say that this seems like a possible prospect, especially as we’re told by the analyst firm that PC makers are cutting Q2 orders for SSDs and that will likely continue into the second half of 2024, which should beneficially affect the supply and demand balance to hopefully ease pricing further.
In other words, we may be at the point now where it’s a fair idea to wait and buy a solid-state drive, certainly if you’re in no rush to grab one of the best SSDs. While firmly bearing in mind that prices are still set to increase throughout this quarter, through to July, even if the upward movement may not be that much (and it’ll vary across different models, of course).
This is, of course, assuming that TrendForce is right with its latest report. It’s worth remembering that the firm’s prediction for Q1 was previously a 15% to 20% hike, so that undershot what actually happened (or TrendForce’s estimation of it) by 8%. Early in 2024, we were also hearing some pretty ominous things about huge SSD price increases, so in short, we are far from out of the proverbial woods yet.
Seeing the picture after Q2’s stats are in will likely give us a much clearer idea of where SSD pricing is heading over the course of this year.
Via Tom’s Hardware