SanDisk's $2,960 PS5 SSD launch faces chip shortage headwinds - MSN

SanDisk's officially licensed PS5 SSDs face significant pricing challenges due to global chip shortages, with the 8TB model retailing at $2,959.99—exceeding the console's price. This reflects the seve... Read original →

The AI infrastructure boom’s voracious demand for NAND and DRAM has pushed consumer storage into a cost crisis. SanDisk’s PS5 SSD priced above the console itself reveals a structural imbalance in the memory stack under high-bandwidth, high-capacity pressure. Technically, QLC NAND yield limitations combined with HBM packaging capacity crowding out legacy nodes marginalize gaming applications in allocation priority. On the compliance front, tightening U.S.-Japan-Netherlands equipment export controls constrain supply chain flexibility—even with packaging/test capacity in Taiwan, China and Hong Kong, China unable to offset advanced-material shortages. Samsung and Kioxia will likely pivot product mixes toward enterprise SSDs to protect margins, further starving the consumer segment. Over the next 18 months, sub-$1,000 8TB+ consumer SSDs remain unlikely; instead, vendors will accelerate adoption of CXL-based memory pooling to bypass NAND scaling bottlenecks—signaling the end of the 'capacity equals affordability' era.