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The RAM shortage could last years

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Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#301

Post by 0-_-0 »

justsomehnguy wrote: post #267
michaelbuckbee wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Memory makers make capital investements (build different factories, convert physical production lines, etc.) to meet orders that have been place for the next ~5 years. OpenAI (or whoever) crashes and can't pay for the order leaving the memory makers in a tough spot.

> leaving the memory makers in a tough spot Oh noes! Think of a poor memory makers! The amount of money flowing both from the AI bubble and from quite literally scalping both the server and consumer market... They gambled on the opportunity and if they fail - it's their problem.

Exactly, that's why they are not building more capacity and that's why RAM prices will stay up for years.

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#302

Post by mazurnification »

paganel wrote: post #291
Epa095 wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Renewables is the only realistic path to energy independence. Today's global situation should show the absolute necessity of that, even if you dont give a sh*t about the environment. Had we done more 10 years ago we would have been better of. The second best time to start is now.

Europe still has coal, lots of it, not using it is a political choice and a self-inflicted wound.

It does not. That is not economically mined. Last big hard coal producer in EU - Poland, has extraction cost x2 or x3 of the mountain top removal mining in US. This sector is shrinking rapidly. Poland coal production came back to ~1915 levels (taking into account current PL territory). This sector would be closed already if not for massive subsidies.

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#303

Post by tonyedgecombe »

LastTrain wrote: post #247

Something I haven’t been able to reconcile: If AI makes software easier to create, that will drive the price down. How are software companies going to make enough revenue to pay for AI, when the amount of money being spent on AI is already multiples of the current total global expenditure on software? This demand for RAM is built on a foundation of sand, there will be a glut of capacity when it all shakes out.

> This demand for RAM is built on a foundation of sand

RAM is built on a foundation of sand.

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#304

Post by zozbot234 »

tverbeure wrote: post #198
platevoltage wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was gonna say, I still use an AMD Vega that uses HBM2.

Vega was a card with decent perf/$ for the consumer, but from a pure technical point of view (perf/mm2, perf/BW, perf/W) it was a major failure. Both Vega (and Fiji before it) showed that excess memory BW alone is not sufficient to win.

> Both Vega (and Fiji before it) showed that excess memory BW alone is not sufficient to win.

That's correct if you're targeting gamers, but local AI inference changes this picture substantially.

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#305

Post by antonvs »

LNSY wrote: post #229
torginus wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Radeon VII came out in 2019 as a $700 consumer GPU with an 1TB/s HBM2 memory subsystem which is more than any consumer GPU you can get today, including the high-end ones afaik. At that point in time, there was a whole lineup of AMD GPUs with HBM going down into the midrange. If they could make this stuff and sell it to regular people a decade ago for very palatable prices, why do they come up with the idea that t…

[flagged]

Only indirectly. They have most of the money, so if they want something that’s in short supply, the price will rise to the point that it becomes unaffordable to everyone else.

Reason number 7,322 why US-style ultracapitalism is self-destructive, anti-social, and dystopian.

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#306

Post by energy123 »

paganel wrote: post #291
Epa095 wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Renewables is the only realistic path to energy independence. Today's global situation should show the absolute necessity of that, even if you dont give a sh*t about the environment. Had we done more 10 years ago we would have been better of. The second best time to start is now.

Europe still has coal, lots of it, not using it is a political choice and a self-inflicted wound.

Last year, China's coal use decreased, while China installed 300x more renewables than nuclear. Coal and nuclear aren't cost competitive with renewables, either in a free market or a technocratic top-down economy. Coal and gas still maintain a valid niche of firming intermittency. But that niche is temporary and shrinking.

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#307

Post by atwrk »

wmf wrote: post #226
metalcrow wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do the memory makers not have a contract in place for an order this large? I assume that they aren't going to take "trust us bro" as good enough for several million dollars in orders, and even if there is a way to cancel the order it won't be free. I would assume so at least, but i would like if anyone knew for certain.

Instead of canceling the orders, OpenAI could take delivery and immediately flip the DRAM for a profit.

That would also be a pretty obvious admission of defeat for their original business model, though...

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#308

Post by stackbutterflow »

gtech1 wrote: post #232
krastanov wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who has been projecting FTL as a realistic technology ever? FTL is not possible according to the current laws of Physics, while AGI is at least not forbidden by them.

We don't even know what human consciousness is. We can't even answer if we have free will or not. And you are proposing that AGI..is what exactly ?

The IQ of the smartest human, the perfect memory storing and recollection of computers, the fact that it never tires. I don't know if it's AGI but it's already something greater than us.

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#309

Post by energy123 »

drnick1 wrote: post #199
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add a more local hurdle as well, the Dutch power grid is at capacity and its managing company is now telling companies that planned to build a datacenter that they can't be connected to the grid until 2030, even though said companies already paid for and got guarantees about that connection. That is, memory capacity is reserved for datacenters yet to be built, but this will do weird things if said datacenter const…

This just highlights what an utter failure and self-inflicted wound the green policies of Euro countries have been. Europe has already lost the AI race to the U.S. and China.

China and Texas are both installing silly amounts of renewables. They install very little new fossil fuels or nuclear. They both maintain cheap electricity prices through abundance.

The problem in the EU is not renewables, it's the same problem that Democratic states in the US face. Regulations and permitting hurdles that block private renewable energy developers.

Re: The RAM shortage could last years

#310

Post by varispeed »

parl_match wrote: post #299
torginus wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Radeon VII came out in 2019 as a $700 consumer GPU with an 1TB/s HBM2 memory subsystem which is more than any consumer GPU you can get today, including the high-end ones afaik. At that point in time, there was a whole lineup of AMD GPUs with HBM going down into the midrange. If they could make this stuff and sell it to regular people a decade ago for very palatable prices, why do they come up with the idea that t…

> why do they come up with the idea that this is the technology of the gods, unaffordable by mere mortals? because the gods want it all and are willing to pay top dollar.

Isn't this the case of money going from left pocket to the right, since these companies are owned by the same investment funds?

I wonder whether this is some kind of a racket.

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