# Prize Decay for Memory Chips

| Shown are the average prizes for DRAMs as a function of time for each generation
| Note that the scale is logarithmic!
|  | While you may get around $100 for chip for a short time, you will be down to a few $ within 3 - 4 years!
|  | There are influences beyond your control. In bad years the Dollar exchange rate may kill you (chips are always sold in $$). If you are lucky, trade restrictions (by the Americans in 87/88) make the commodity scarce and prizes go actually up (see the 1 Mbit; very unusual!).
| What this prize decay really means is very graphically illustrated below where the cost of 1 Mbit of 1 Mbit memory is expressed in every day items

With frame

5.3.1 Moore's Law and what it Means

© H. Föll (Semiconductor Technology - Script)