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Comment by mock-possum | Hacker News Reader

> delivery times for enterprise-grade HDDs delayed by two years.

I sleep

> so hyperscalers are now switching to QLC NAND-based SSDs to avoid these backorders … This could lead to SSD prices rising worldwide

Real shit

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The funniest thing about this is that, with high GPU prices, rising RAM costs, and now increasing SSD prices, Apple will end up producing the most affordable PCs.

Apple uses the same RAM, SSD, etc as everyone else does. They don't have a magic supply chain that is unaffected by the broader world.

They don't use the same SSDs? They don't use the same RAM? They have their own supply chain in place? Whatcha talking about bud?

They use the same suppliers. The problem is the base chip, and also the wafer itself, all of which will impact apple.

(apple doesn't use hdds so not talking about that here).

The problem is not chip supply it's manufacturing. Apple has their own manufacturing suppply. This is not the chip crisis of the last years. Hyper scalers are switching to consumer hardware because there is nothing in storage for Prosumer anymore and the manufacturing pipelines for these are smaller and harder to scale than consumer ones.

Appple uses custom DRAM and NAND chips?

The NAND itself seems to come from companies like SK Hynix, which are currently struggling to meet demand.

Apple doesn't make their own NAND, just like they don't make their own screens. They did write their own NAND controller and stuck it into their CPUs, but the flash memory that actually stores data doesn't come directly from their factories.

It's not a fucking nand problem. The producers reduced capacity because of the slow consumer PC market in 2024. With hyperscalers shifting to consumer products the market is strained but everyone is scaling up their production now. This is not the same as the chip shortage we had in the last few years. The production capabilities are there they are just adjusting to new market realities. We will see a whiplash for a few months but we can and will produce enough chips for everyone which we were not able to do in the 20-22 crisis. Stop getting your "insights" from influencers and stop parroting them.

It's ABSOLUTELY a chip shortage. TSMC is booked out years in advance and jacking prices because they can.

On the dram side, because that's what I saw recently, sk hynix is down to TWO WEEKS of inventory: https://wccftech.com/sk-hynix-ddr5-inventory-down-to-just-2-...

I'd be curious what evidence there is to support its purely an end-product manufacturing shortage?

I don't see any evidence of a general chip shortage in your link either. That they are down in stock because of unprecedented demand after a downturn in the last 3 years in consumer demands of consumer products is something completely different than being down because of production capacity. They reduced production in 2023 and 2024. It's exactly what I wrote in my previous comment.

"As mentioned previously, the rip-roaring demand for HBM products is reducing the available wafer capacity for other DRAM and NAND products, reducing their supply in the process. We noted in a recent post that the global average delivery times for DDR5 are now quite stretched, currently hovering between 26 and 39 weeks.

Coming back, SK Hynix announced at its earnings call that it has fully booked its DRAM and NAND capacity through 2026, with HBM4 set to ship by the end of 2025."

Yes, but Apple tends to lock in their supply with long term contracts and prepayments, so they often are protected from supply shocks.

They have a magic supply chain that is unaffected by the broader world which is one of the reasons why Tim Apple was chosen by Steve Jobs as his successor.

If every other PC is more expensive, they will just increase prices.

No, Apple has effectively promoted iCloud as the alternative to local storage as part of its product differentiation strategy in the lower price segment.

Apple will almost certainly introduce the same approach for the budget MacBook as well.

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