Hard times for DRAM industry means good news for users

ITworld.com 10/19/01

Sumner Lemon and Martyn Williams, IDG News Service, Taipei Bureau

[Excerpt from article] Thinking of an upgrade to your PC or planning to buy a new one? If so, now may be the time to add a bit more memory to your computer as memory-chip makers -- hit hard by a sharp drop in prices -- have been forced to sell memory chips for less than it costs to produce them.

"Everyone is selling below cost,"said Dorothy Lai, a semiconductor analyst at Gartner Inc.

For consumers wanting to upgrade their machines or those building their own computers from parts, the collapse in prices has had some very noticeable benefits. A year ago, a 128M-byte stick of SDRAM (synchronous DRAM) cost around US$41 on Asia's memory market, according to data from memory-chip price tracker ICIS-LOR. Today that same stick of memory costs less than $10.

For users wanting to pack more advanced DDR or Rambus memory chips into their machines, the drops have been even more dramatic. A 128M-byte stick of DDR memory has fallen from around $250 a year ago to $20 today and Rambus memory has dropped from $320 per stick to $45 today.

-- Rich (living_in_interesting_times@hotmail.com), October 19, 2001

Answers

I STILL cannot comprehend these prices. A part of me cannot get out of the $1/megabyte mindset. Adding RAM to a PC is simple to do and at these prices probably offers the single greatest bang for the buck in the consumer universe.

-- Rich (living_in_interesting_times@hotmail.com), October 19, 2001.

A part of me cannot get out of the $1/megabyte mindset.

I can remember when RAM was $50 a meg and the 40meg HD in my new 286 loaded with the latest version of Windows (Win 3.1) with a 15" VGA monitor and 2400MNP5 modem was hot stuff.

Hard to believe now that I paid $2000.00 for that then.

Sigh...those were the days. LOL!!!

-- (101010@101010.com), October 19, 2001.

Thanks for this, Rich. SO had me look up something on the Internet for him today and print out the page. He stood back in amazement as it all took so long. He confessed that he was spoiled by his PC at work, and I said, "You've gotta understand that I'm dealing with some old slow stuff here." He said, "Can't you upgrade?" I said, "Yeah, but I'm unwilling to spend the money." Maybe I will now that I know it's not an arm and a leg.

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), October 19, 2001.

Christmas is coming, Anita. Treat yourself - or better yet let the kids & SO pool together a few hundred bucks and get you a new computer. Everything is dirt cheap, from hard drives to monitors, processors to RAM. The only computer item I can think of that hasn't plummetted in price is inkjet cartridges.

101010, that 15" monitor was a real pricey piece in those days. Wouldn't be surprised that package cost you well over $2000 depending on how much RAM you got.

-- Rich (living_in_interesting_times@hotmail.com), October 19, 2001.

Rich are you going to be Santa Fag this year? Let all the little boys sit on you lap. Perhaps anita will bring her spook step children.

-- (Ho@ho.BWHAHAHAHAH), October 19, 2001.

mah neeshtana halila hozzeh...why is this night unlike any other night? In other words, I'm Santa Fag all year 'round. Why change? ROTFL! Now you know who I REALLY am! BTW-SANTA=SATAN forget the red suit, beware my red eyes!

-- Rich (living_in_interesting_times@hotmail.com), October 19, 2001.

Rich: All I really need is more memory. I'm quite happy with the rest. My brother upgraded his PC, and I'm sure he could help me with any questions I might have.

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), October 19, 2001.

Ah dear santafag are you professing to be something you are not?

bend over here comes rudolph

-- (Bwahahah@ha.hahah), October 19, 2001.

Well, let me add a caveat there. My printer is slow and my modem is slow, but WHY would I need an instantaneous response to ANYTHING from a home computer? I'm not interested in obtaining a state-of-the-art system at this time. I'd already done that at another time, and I'm quite aware that what is state-of-the-art TODAY will be old-hat tomorrow.

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), October 19, 2001.

I agree with your point of view, Anita. The only reason to upgrade your computer is when you need something from it that it isn't capable of doing for you, either in terms of capacity or speed. My current computer is quite slow and incapable by today's standards. But it does what I ask of it perfectly well.

If I ever need it to do more, I'll be ecstatic that prices on the new stuff are so low and upgrades are so cheap.

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), October 19, 2001.