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| How is Chipageddon affecting you? |
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| tom66:
--- Quote from: peter-h on February 07, 2023, 02:31:21 pm ---I am pretty sure the above 13 week period is not at all related to the fab lead time. The chips need to be tested, packaged, etc. That leadtime is probably a good few months. --- End quote --- Fab lead time is probably the biggest single factor since it's highly specialised. Packaging and bonding is often done in another country, usually a country with cheaper labour. Though in some areas you have things like ABF (film) or BGA packaging capacity being the choke point for instance for GPUs and the likes... I recall that was a choke point earlier in 2021. |
| peter-h:
The "end user" lead time is not related to the manufacturing process. It is virtually certain that chips in general are made in batches and each batch goes on the shelf. Hence when you look at date codes you find these in discrete "quanta" with many missing codes. Lead time is quoted to manipulate demand and to create fear. The typical cycle is that prices generally keep falling, slowly. At a certain point the business decides it has gone too far and the reps are instructed to spread the feared "a"-word: allocation. Then buyers go crazy and start placing orders. You get shortages and 26 week lead times. 6 months later there is a bloodbath and things are good for another year or two. And it swaps around. One year you get tantalum caps. Another year you would get RAM chips... Since I started in my own business in 1978 I've seen this many times. This time it lasted 3 years due to covid having distorted everything. But the bloodbath will be bigger, too, and much more satisfying to those who actually create wealth (manufacturers) than those who just skim a percentage off the top (resellers) :) The famous LM2936 is now back to pre-bubble pricing. Maxim is still trying to hang in there with totally crazy pricing. Just had a conversation with their "chatline" and they are still not communicating in a normal human way; it is still using support tickets on their website <bang head > which I could not log into despite assistance :) They don't seem to know that a MAX489 has a drop in replacement at 1/3 of the price. |
| Karel:
A clear sign that things have gone back to normal is when the RPI4 will be plenty available for the normal price. |
| paulca:
--- Quote from: Karel on February 24, 2023, 10:09:39 am ---A clear sign that things have gone back to normal is when the RPI4 will be plenty available for the normal price. --- End quote --- Not when the audiophiles are buying/selling RPISnakeOil "network streaming FIFOs" for £500. |
| tom66:
--- Quote from: Karel on February 24, 2023, 10:09:39 am ---A clear sign that things have gone back to normal is when the RPI4 will be plenty available for the normal price. --- End quote --- RPi has faced shortages well before Chipageddon. There is an argument that it is a little underpriced given the demand they receive for the product but it was originally an educational 'toy' and it's since been taken up by loads of SMEs as an easy way to embed Linux into X (whether or not it really requires it.) |
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