Buying the cheap configuration and topping up the memory later no longer works. That is what this shortage broke.

Micron quit selling memory to ordinary people after 29 years, and Apple's cheapest laptop is the one whose memory you can never upgrade.

  • HP reported its own memory costs roughly doubled in a single quarter, and IDC expects the average PC to sell for 17 percent more than last year.
  • Framework put standalone memory back on sale, but its published price had reached 13 to 18 dollars a gigabyte by spring, up from 10 in December.
  • Apple's 8-gigabyte MacBook Neo has its memory sealed inside the processor's own package, and went from 599 dollars to 699.

Buy the memory with the machine, and check for a socket before you check the processor.