Selling ice cubes in a blizzard, or pool floaties on the International Space Station, or inflatable dart boards. It’s hard to think of a situation more unfortunate than launching a line of premium, high-performance gaming memory during a RAM shortage, when PC buyers are extremely anxious about rising prices. Yet here we are—or, at least, here sits Asus.
The company just debuted a new 48GB DDR5-6000 kit. That’s two gold-and-red-festooned DIMMs decked out with RGB lighting that, presumably, isn’t so dim. At the time of the announcement, the first memory sold under the Asus ROG brand is exclusive to China and planned for a launch in June, with a 6,000-yuan price tag (equivalent to a bit more than $880 USD). That’s pricey even in the current insanity of the market—you can get a pair of reliable, faster G-Skill DIMMs for under $600 on Amazon right now—but the ROG brand is well known for pricing its way out of consideration for many buyers. It’s also getting some “20th Anniversary” bling, celebrating the Republic of Gamers label.
According to promotional info spotted by VideoCardz, the RAM is actually produced by BiWin, so this could indicate an intention to enter the end-user memory market on a more permanent basis. Asus is also launching the ROG Certified Memory Program that certifies RAM for use in its gaming motherboards, with partners including Biwin, Corsair, G.Skill, Kingston, Silicon Power, and more. I don’t see why you need a certification program for memory that’s already adhering to a well-established technical standard, but sure, why not.
There’s no indication of a global launch for ROG memory or the certification program. Considering the woes of the market, I get the feeling that even if Asus were gung-ho to expand its component offerings beyond its current motherboards, GPUs, and power supplies, now might not be the right time to dive in.
