WDC/STX: You are right about the "So 5 vendors become 3 and it is now effectively a duopoly between STX and WDC, together commanding 90% of the market". However, the SSD threat is counterbalancing this - in essence WDC/STX do not have great advantages in SSD field, although they have some and they have some technology inhouse and from acquisitions. You are right that SSD won't replace everything, but if the question is how much they can replace. If the percentage is significant (20%+?) HDD manufacturers will suffer.
I disagree with "Every 3-4 years, you may not want to upgrade your OS, PC or CPU. But you HAVE to replace your HDD even if you have no intention to upgrade anything or increase storage volume, because it wears out." I have multiple PCs at home. And I haven't replaced a single HDD yet (fingers crossed) due to failures. I had to replace multiple PCs due to chipset, GPU, motherboard, etc. failures. I have only bought HDDs for backup/volume increase. Of course, if I buy a new computer I get a new HDD as well as new CPU/GPU/etc. Still I don't agree with your conclusion that HDDs are more frequently replaced than the PC/CPU/GPU/etc. Perhaps it's different in other settings or perhaps I was just lucky.
I haven't read about the flood. If what you say is correct, probably it's too early to buy. I am surprised that the things are so bad as to "next 2 quarters will be in red... it'll take them a year or so to get back to normal operation". What percentage of manufacturing is affected? How much the sales will drop? If they can't fulfill orders for a year, this is bad in terms of competitive position...
Looking forward to more info. :) |
