One PC building firm has an answer to harsh DRR5 price hikes: BYO RAM - and it's not a bad idea

Scared RAM price hikes will make your new PC a lot pricier? 'BYO RAM' is Maingear's answer - meaning you provide your own memory News (Image credit: Maingear) Darren Allan published Bring Your Own RAM Maingear has launched a BYO RAM scheme This allows buyers of prebuilt PCs to supply their own system RAM Assuming you have RAM, or can get a good deal on DDR5 memory, this could save you some money on a new PC - albeit with caveats Maingear has revealed a new scheme to give the buyers of its prebuilt PCs a possible workaround for the increased cost of these computers due to RAM price hikes - it's called BYO RAM. I guess that should be BYOR, technically, but the principle is as you'd expect - you're providing the system memory for the PC Maingear is selling you. The prospective scenario is as follows: obviously buying a PC with 16GB (or 32GB ideally) of contemporary system RAM is a lot pricier now, with hikes meaning the cost of DDR5 memory has shot up at an unbelievable pace. So, you pick a Maingear PC with no system RAM, and you send memory you already have - either already-used memory from another PC, perhaps, or a RAM kit that you've bought having got a good deal online (or what passes for one these days) - to the system builder. Maingear then uses that DDR5 RAM in the build, fully tests it as normal, before supplying you the machine (with no charge for the RAM, obviously). This service is available now, and you can configure your BYO RAM build at Maingear's website , choosing from a variety of base Maingear custom PC builds - just pick the BYO option in the memory drop-down. (Currently you'll save $300 on the price for dropping 32GB of DDR5 RAM, so if you can score your memory for less than that, you're onto a winner). In its press release announcing the scheme, Maingear makes it clear that these custom PCs still go through "standard validation before shipping", meaning the various testing processes to make sure the computer works fine. Analysis: potential issues with BYOR Can we expect more custom PC builders to offer similar workarounds for sky-high RAM pricing? Quite possibly, indeed I wouldn't be surprised at all, but this is a somewhat complicated way of working things, as you can imagine. Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. One obviously key issue is whether the RAM is compatible with the motherboard and PC build, and Maingear provides a step-by-step explainer on ensuring that this is the case. It's also possible to send in multiple RAM kits, if you have them, and Maingear will select the best option (and return the others to you along with your newly built PC). If you're unsure about anything, you can contact Maingear with questions, and I'd definitely advise you to do so if you have any doubts. Maingear also clarifies that...

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