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Politics : Ask Michael Burke -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Skeeter Bug who wrote (76532)	2/25/2000 10:59:00 AM
From: Don Lloyd	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 132070

SB - [[...>>Did you see Samsung's announcement to build a sub $200 PC using exclusively Rambus?<< missed that one. what, 1 meg rdram? i bet we don't see such a box for a long, long time - if ever at all....]] The key was that it was unexpandable. They can paste their own unmarkedup parts directly onto the PCB without needing to build a module or perform separate memory testing. It is possible that they may even be able to use partial reject parts from their own commercial production, making their cost near zero. It certainly is no indication of commercial viability, and being low end, it says nothing about performance. Regards, Don

To: Skeeter Bug who wrote (76532)	2/25/2000 11:25:00 AM
From: Steve Lee	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 132070

"with little benefit proved in the field, the current excess cost will prohibit demand." I agree on the benefit right now. With today's processors and today's RDRAM costs, I would not spec RDRAM into my system. However, many disagree. Cost is not prohibiting demand. All Rambus production is sold out and the major players are scrambling to ramp up. "you say supply and demand determines pricing then go on to say the price of rdram was high b/c demand was so strong. you bold demand and ignore supply. hmmmmm... a freudian slip? or a knowledgeable hype?" As you said later, demand is more of an unknown whereas their own production capacity is known. So you could see supply as a constant at any point in time, therefore it is demand that is determining price, and that could make Samsung adjust their RDRAM prices from week to week. Demand is high and prices are high to match. As supply increases along with yields and the number of manufacturers and fab lines, cost will come down. You are right about Samsung having a rare control over RDRAM price. They have almost a monopoly (but are not supplying PlayStation). This is a short term scenario and they will have to give in to market forces - forcing prices down as competitors ramp up. And about DDR RAM. It is not available. If it is so good, why aren't the major DRAM players ramping it? Surely they know more about yields, pricing and performance than we do. DDR RAM may be competitive performance wise with today's processor speeds, but it doesn't cut it with the higher speeds. DDR is SDRAM pushed to the limit - The last hope of the old technology, and it isn't even available yet. Today's RDRAM is the first iteration of what Intel is calling the next generation. Intel has some clout in this industry.