The AI Boom Just Made a Critical Piece of Tech Nearly Impossible to Afford

AI is revolutionising everything, but it is also increasing the price of technology significantly. In that regard, presently, there is a shortage of memory chips that are common in high speeds. Because AI needs so much data, companies are fighting over the same parts. This has caused the price of high-end storage drives to skyrocket in just one year. It is a major headache for the people who build the servers that keep the internet running.

The figures are staggering when one realises that a year ago, a high-end drive, which cost around $3,000, now costs around $11,000 today. That is a huge jump for any business to handle. While old-school mechanical hard drives have also gone up in price, they are still much cheaper. In fact, the fast drives are now 16 times more expensive than the slower ones. This gap is changing how companies plan their budgets.

Due to the high prices, many companies have started to adapt their strategies. Instead of using fully high-performance drives, the companies have started to mix different technologies. They use the fast drives for quick tasks and the mechanical ones to store things for the long term. This "hybrid" approach is a lifesaver for the bottom line. It can save a company nearly $20 million over a few years compared to using only the expensive stuff.

It is good to note that this solution did not come overnight and experts thinks that it will be an ongoing standard until 2027. Storage disks for regular computers in homes are even beginning to feel like an extravagance. As long as the world stays hungry for AI, the parts we need to store data will remain hard to find. Companies are being forced to rethink their entire future just to keep up with the rising costs.