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Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

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Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There will be two classes: those who are part of the perpetual underclass and those who are not. And 98 percent of the population will be part of it.

There are _already_ two classes: Those who earn their living from their labor, and those whose income is derived simply by owning things they (often) didn't create themselves and charge for access.

You talk like this is new, it's the way it's always been.

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The C64 sold "between 12.5 and 17 million units" in its lifetime [0], vs. worldwide PC shipments of "71.5 million units in the fourth quarter of 2025 ." (emphasis mine) [1] It's truly an apples (hehe) to oranges comparison, and in my opinion it only reinforces the point that "normal people" will no longer be able to purchase computers, just like the C64 was not a mainstream product. [0] https://web.archive.org/web/20…

> "normal people" will no longer be able to purchase computers, Starbucks' revenue was almost $10B in the last quarter. Most people can clearly afford $1/day for something as useful as a computer.

That seems like a false equivalence to me, even if we ignore the fact that only 21% of that revenue came from non-US countries. There are enormous chunks of the world where the local equivalent of $1500 is a life-changing amount of money.

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#203
It looks like we are going to start to see consumer components stop being created in the first place, as demand dries up to the point where it's no longer worth it to serve the consumer market at all. Almost purely because the supply is already so low that almost no one is willing to pay the price.

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#204

When photosynthesis first appeared, the oxygen it produced poisoned the existing life. Sulfur-breathers basically disappeared. In the geologic record the oxygen shows up as massive layers of iron oxide which we mine and turn into steel now. New things can radically shake up the existing environment, the degree of shakeup is the measure of how radical it is.

Great analogy! Unfortunately we are the sulfur breathers.

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#205
post #59

PC is the last major open platform. While other platforms like Android and becoming less open, PC in general is becoming more open than it's been in a long time as heavy MacOS/Android/iOS competition is creating a focus on open standards and all-time high strong Linux support gives people a place to land and tinker/hack to their heart's content. I think we will see an abandonment of consumer grade PC components and i…

Buy steam deck, and steam box.

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#206
post #145

Motherboards used to be $100, $200 for the high end. Now they want $300+, ram is crazy, storage, video cards, etc. I'm not surprised sales for these components is hitting a wall.

Buying whole 2020 era PCs here for around $200 mark. As long as you don't need crazy CPU or GPU grunt, which is most people, they are almost indistinguishable from a new one. Windows 10 LTSC + Firefox + uBlock Origin on an i5-9400 feels faster than my M4 Pro MBP. Probably same or better on Linux.

Windows 10 LTSC isn't a realistic option for most people.

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#207
post #41
post #24

High end resins and epoxies are in a critical supply shortage right now. I suspect that there are going to be some serious resource driven PCB shortages in the very near future.

Is anything not in a shortage?

bad news

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#208
post #59

PC is the last major open platform. While other platforms like Android and becoming less open, PC in general is becoming more open than it's been in a long time as heavy MacOS/Android/iOS competition is creating a focus on open standards and all-time high strong Linux support gives people a place to land and tinker/hack to their heart's content. I think we will see an abandonment of consumer grade PC components and i…

> ... or they are pushed towards server grade components. I already have home sever rack, and would recommend it for other people.

An actual rack with noisy 1U or 2U servers may be a bit overkill but on the plus side there's a guaranteed endless supply of such used servers.

Now there's a happy middle ground: used workstations with ECC memory, that you then use as servers.

People would be really wise to not underestimate what a 12 years old dual-Xeon, 14 cores each, 56 threads in total can do, for example. And such a complete workstation can basically be found for less than what it takes to fill my car's gas tank (granted it's got a big tank and it's fancy car whose manufacturer recommends to only use 98+ octane).

A single Xeon workstation with shitload of memory in a tower form factor is basically silent. Mine is. Dead quiet, next to the vaccuum cleaner and the cat's foot in a tiny room. I use it as a headless server.

And that's with the default PSU and fans. There are, of course, people modding these with adapters for regular consumer PSUs and then putting ultra-quiet PSUs in those. Same with Noctua fans etc.

And as for the usual complain: "but a server that is on 24/7 consumes too much electricity"... I only turn on my servers at home when I begin to work: I don't need these to be on 24/7.

So yeah: "Server CPU + ECC" doesn't imply noise. And "Server CPU + ECC" doesn't imply it has to be on 24/7 neither.

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#209
post #145

Motherboards used to be $100, $200 for the high end. Now they want $300+, ram is crazy, storage, video cards, etc. I'm not surprised sales for these components is hitting a wall.

Buying whole 2020 era PCs here for around $200 mark. As long as you don't need crazy CPU or GPU grunt, which is most people, they are almost indistinguishable from a new one. Windows 10 LTSC + Firefox + uBlock Origin on an i5-9400 feels faster than my M4 Pro MBP. Probably same or better on Linux.

Upgrade my cpu the other day, got a ryzen 5 5600 for ~$100 new, can't complain. Still on my rtx 2060, can't complain either. As long as you don't fall for the 120hz and 4k memes you can easily get by with 2020 hardware indeed.

Re: Motherboard sales 'collapse' amid unprecedented shortages fueled by AI

#210
post #157
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they own nothing but make believe stocks and life works great for them. The mega-rich are 100% decoupled from physical reality. May as well treat them more like tribal shaman, priests, preachers, and rabbis. Just parroting memes the likewise idiot politicians believe are the magic chants that keep gravity itself pulling together the Earth. "Omg he said the thing! Cut his taxes! Give him welfare!" Our generati…

Why is it that new accounts these days always seem to come out swinging about politics, class warfare, etc?

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