[andr]

8GB of LPDDR3 costs about $30 retail. So they went from a 330% markup to a 660% markup. Nice.

[shockinglytrue]

Pretty hilarious, 32gb sodimms are only 150 GBP in the UK, Apple charging 200 for 16. Similarly, 2TB disk for 800 GBP, open market it's 219.

Some PC laptop vendor could do a whole TV campaign based around the idea of turtle-necked folk setting fire to money and smiling, because it makes them feel better, and that's really all that matters[.. right?]

[saddlerustle]

Please let me know where I can buy an 8GB 2133Mhz LPDDR3 module for $30, because that's a very very good price.

[llampx]

Wouldn't LPDDR be more expensive for the retail customer because it is not used that often? Most of the Wintel laptops have standardized on regular DDR4 SODIMMs and it looks like Macs use LP variants, where Apple is surely getting volume discounts.

[sdinsn]

You can find one on Newegg for $35

[cptskippy]

Partly in their defense, the RAM is soldered to the board.

This limits the spaces available to RAM so they're probably swapping out higher density (i.e. more expensive) chips. They also can't just pull a Macbook off the shelf, slap an extra DIMM in it, box it up, and ship it.

It's their own fault but... yeah.

[kasabali]

I've never seen LPDDR3 sold retail, how does it work?

[devy]

Yeah, on those rare spec chips that are not on the retail market, Apple probably have to place custom order to the memory chip manufacturers for a low-yield production, which is definitely causing the unit pricing to be much higher than the mass produced memory chips. Economy of scale. (even if Apple is still a big customer, it's still a small order to make if no other computer makers use that spec of the chips)

[timw4mail]

LPDDR3 is not sold on dimms.

[hammock]

Is it easy to install your own RAM in MacBooks these days? I used to do it all the time 20 years ago and I know times have changed.

[wil421]

The RAM has been soldered onto the logic boards for quite a while now. Probably approaching 10 years for the first models without removable RAM.

[Matthias247]

impossible. It's soldered on the mainboard.

[barkingcat]

no Ram or Storage upgrades on Macbooks for many years now.

[chrisseaton]

230% to markup to 560% markup.

[tpmx]

This is why it makes more sense to say "3.3x vs 6.6x more expensive". It's better aligned with how people actually think.

[1-6]

Because... Chrome.

[robin_reala]

Not that I agree with Apple’s pricing, but you have to assume this isn’t adding an extra 8GB, but changing the existing packages out for ones with double the density. That presumably is more expensive than just adding the same amount again of the lower-capacity packages.

[ChuckNorris89]

This isn't a phone, most likely the motherboard has free solder pads for extra RAM chips.