Question Should I wait for DDR5?

[nexus5rocks]

My computer is 10 years old (i7 2600k). It's seen an upgrade to SSD when I went to Win10 and that's it. It is purely a productivity machine these days. My gaming days are pretty much over. Even the few games I play run decently well on it.

I am out of the loop when it comes hardware in the last decade. I have recently decided that it might be time to build another machine and use the current one as a backup, given that my PC is my livelihood now with WFH.
I did some light reading and see that DDR5 is coming around the corner. I've waited this long, should I wait a little longer?

What surprises me is that it seems like 2 x 8GB is still the standard configuration. I would've expected 2 x 16GB at the very least. I have 4 x 8GB currently and would like at least 32GB since I run VMs occasionally.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Wow, Sandy Bridge era, represent!

Seriously though, if you want 2x16GB, get 2x16GB. I have 4x8GB RGB in my Zen2 / Ryzen R5 3600 PC.

Right now's not a great time to buy parts, unless you want a 10th-Gen Intel at a slight discount.

OTOH, Comet Lake tops out at 10 cores, and Rocket Lake only 8 cores.

 

[Pohemi]

If you need to upgrade, upgrade.

You can/would be waiting endlessly for "that next big advancement" if you are debating whether to wait for next gen on system memory.

DDR5 desktop RAM isn't going to be out and available widely in the next 6 months, so...

If you put off upgrading beyond DDR3 for this many years, then you do not have a legitimate need to wait for DDR5 before upgrading, you obviously don't require bleeding edge...not even for that silly fantasy notion of "futureproofing" a new build.

 

[nexus5rocks]

Wow, Sandy Bridge era, represent!

Seriously though, if you want 2x16GB, get 2x16GB. I have 4x8GB RGB in my Zen2 / Ryzen R5 3600 PC.

Right now's not a great time to buy parts, unless you want a 10th-Gen Intel at a slight discount.

OTOH, Comet Lake tops out at 10 cores, and Rocket Lake only 8 cores.

Right, I've been reading that availability isn't great (for CPUs and GPUs) but I live near a Microcenter that has 5600x in stock for $300. That seems like the sweet spot at the moment.

 

[nexus5rocks]

If you need to upgrade, upgrade.

You can/would be waiting endlessly for "that next big advancement" if you are debating whether to wait for next gen on system memory.

DDR5 desktop RAM isn't going to be out and available widely in the next 6 months, so...

If you put off upgrading beyond DDR3 for this many years, then you do not have a legitimate need to wait for DDR5 before upgrading, you obviously don't require bleeding edge...not even for that silly fantasy notion of "futureproofing" a new build.

I don't need to upgrade right away. If my rig dies, I can run off my laptop for awhile, and my company would send me a thin/thick client of some sort.

I'm not exactly trying to futureproof, as you can tell I keep my PC for longer than the average user.
I'm almost like a 'skip a generation kinda guy'. Went from Win7 to Win10 (as most probably did), and PS3 to PS5 (when I can finally get my hands on one).

But since I've waited so long, I figure what's another 6-12 months. Any other major architectural changes around the corner? NVME seems to be another big change in the computing world.

 

[VirtualLarry]

But since I've waited so long, I figure what's another 6-12 months. Any other major architectural changes around the corner?

There are some. Zen4, with some IPC increases and possibly AVX512 support in the cores. I don't know if that will be for a DDR5 platform (only?), or if AMD will produce them for their AM4 platform as well.

Intel is introducing Alder Lake, which has a Big.Little arrangement of cores. That remains to be seen how well that will work out.

If anything, I wonder if people will think, "how good did we have it", right now.

Especially since the USA economy seems to see the beginnings of HyperInflation, as we can see with GPUs and some other luxury items. If that continues, you'll be kicking yourself for not upgrading, six months down the line, unless you have crypto-currency holdings to buy parts with.

Also, 11th-Gen RocketLake doesn't seem to have any real advantages over CometLake (10th-Gen Intel), and 10th-Gen has more cores at the top-end. I would be happy with a 10900K/KF.

RAM prices are decent, if slowly rising due to HI, as well as SSDs. Intel CPU availability is decent, though getting more thinly stretched as people "rediscover" Intel as a platform choice, due to lack of Ryzen availability.

My feeling is that waiting six months, will see prices rise even more, and availability even WORSE than it is today. (Except GPU pricing might become slightly more sane. Slightly.)