Dikushin Dmitry/Shutterstock It’s not uncommon to find a tech enthusiast at a Goodwill or yard sale, looking to discover rare, vintage, and undervalued gadgets at a great price. It’s the latter case in particular where some strike gold when the less tech-savvy abandon extremely valuable technology simply because they don’t know what they have. This was the case for a Redditor named Sam_Under_Ice, who posted on Reddit that he purchased an i7 desktop computer at Goodwill for $20. When they examined what was inside, they discovered that they had found one of the biggest seams for a technological breakthrough in 2026: 64 GB of DDR4 RAM. There was also more inside the chassis. It contained an i7-12700K, which is a 12th generation Intel processor, with 12 cores and a clock speed of 3.6 GHz (up to 5 GHz via Intel Turbo Boost Max). It offers good performance as a high-powered gaming machine or workstation. It also contained a 1TB SATA hard drive, which is just one of four types of hard drives. But the star of the show was RAM. This is a highly sought-after item at a time when its prices are skyrocketing due to the shortage of AI-based chips. It’s not DDR5, but even DDR4 can fetch hundreds of dollars these days. The Redditor plans to use this find to upgrade his main rig, which has a Ryzen 7 5800X, perhaps because he knows it’s too valuable to part with. What discovery is really worth Nestea06/Getty Images When Sam_Under_Ice posted about this deal, he didn’t think much of it, but the post on Reddit went viral overnight. It has thousands of upvotes with hundreds of comments on the subreddit r/pcmasterrace expressing jealousy, joy, and even rage. The 64GB of RAM is split into two 32GB chips, and each of them is worth between $150 and $180. RAM is expensive because there is a global shortage of consumer RAM. It’s not that people buy a lot of them. Its cause is as artificial as the data centers engulfing it are trying to improve AI capabilities. Demand for AI has exploded in recent years, so data centers need more RAM to help them process and store large amounts of data. This situation led to what is known as “RAMmageddon” or “RAMpocalypse”. With little RAM left for consumer products, its prices have skyrocketed because there isn’t enough to go around. The manufacturers of these products make difficult choices. They must either reduce their production or increase the prices of their products, or both. As for the i7-12700K, that alone starts at $350. The hard drive is the cheapest find, as even new drives start at $50. In total, Sam_Under_Ice came away with components that could cost over $700 (conservative estimate), which isn’t bad after initially spending $20. Post navigation This $700 Laptop Is Consumer Reports’ Top Budget Pick 11 Things You Didn’t Know Your Middle Mouse Button Can Do
Dikushin Dmitry/Shutterstock It’s not uncommon to find a tech enthusiast at a Goodwill or yard sale, looking to discover rare, vintage, and undervalued gadgets at a great price. It’s the latter case in particular where some strike gold when the less tech-savvy abandon extremely valuable technology simply because they don’t know what they have. This was the case for a Redditor named Sam_Under_Ice, who posted on Reddit that he purchased an i7 desktop computer at Goodwill for $20. When they examined what was inside, they discovered that they had found one of the biggest seams for a technological breakthrough in 2026: 64 GB of DDR4 RAM. There was also more inside the chassis. It contained an i7-12700K, which is a 12th generation Intel processor, with 12 cores and a clock speed of 3.6 GHz (up to 5 GHz via Intel Turbo Boost Max). It offers good performance as a high-powered gaming machine or workstation. It also contained a 1TB SATA hard drive, which is just one of four types of hard drives. But the star of the show was RAM. This is a highly sought-after item at a time when its prices are skyrocketing due to the shortage of AI-based chips. It’s not DDR5, but even DDR4 can fetch hundreds of dollars these days. The Redditor plans to use this find to upgrade his main rig, which has a Ryzen 7 5800X, perhaps because he knows it’s too valuable to part with. What discovery is really worth Nestea06/Getty Images When Sam_Under_Ice posted about this deal, he didn’t think much of it, but the post on Reddit went viral overnight. It has thousands of upvotes with hundreds of comments on the subreddit r/pcmasterrace expressing jealousy, joy, and even rage. The 64GB of RAM is split into two 32GB chips, and each of them is worth between $150 and $180. RAM is expensive because there is a global shortage of consumer RAM. It’s not that people buy a lot of them. Its cause is as artificial as the data centers engulfing it are trying to improve AI capabilities. Demand for AI has exploded in recent years, so data centers need more RAM to help them process and store large amounts of data. This situation led to what is known as “RAMmageddon” or “RAMpocalypse”. With little RAM left for consumer products, its prices have skyrocketed because there isn’t enough to go around. The manufacturers of these products make difficult choices. They must either reduce their production or increase the prices of their products, or both. As for the i7-12700K, that alone starts at $350. The hard drive is the cheapest find, as even new drives start at $50. In total, Sam_Under_Ice came away with components that could cost over $700 (conservative estimate), which isn’t bad after initially spending $20.
