While the memory modules that go into DDR4 sticks are still short on supply and costs are still high as a result, the kind of NAND flash that goes into SSDs is abundant and that's leading to big drops in pricing for the storage standard. You can now pick up a 1TB SATA III SSD for as little as $230, putting the high-speed storage technology within reach of most PC gamers.
Back in the late '00s when SSDs were first introduced, you'd have to pay hundreds of dollars for a single SSD that could hold maybe 100GB if you were lucky. Today though, that's very much changed. There are options all the way up to multiple terabyte devices and though if you want PCIE performance or a small M.2 form factor you might have to pay for the privilege, with perfectly competent SATA III drives you can get yourself a lot of high-speed storage for comparatively little.
Prices have been coming down very quickly too. The average price for 500GB and 1TB drives has fallen by more than $50 this year alone. Drives like the
With expectations that manufacturers will only increase the amount of NAND flash they produce in Q3 and Q4 this year, it could be that SSD prices will fall even further in the near future too. We may find that 1TB SSDs will be under $200 by the year's end, making it all but pointless to buy hard drives for big game libraries any more. Sure they're still better for storing terabytes of movies and music, but little else.
