After Japan's Quake, Taiwan Helps Fill iPad 2 Supply-Chain Gaps

RedEaredSlider writes "Like many device manufacturers, Apple cannot seem to escape supply concerns in the wake of the ongoing crisis in Japan. The company is hoping that AU Optronics will fill the void left by companies like Hitachi and Toshiba, both of which have been affected by the series of disasters that have rocked Japan. Damage to many factories from the earthquake and an ongoing nuclear disaster has disrupted supply chains and caused large slowdowns in production of vital electronic components."

Sandy Bridge Upgrade Delays...

[rwade]

I've been looking forward to building a new Sandy Bridge system and the disaster in Japan has thrown quite a wrench in it, I'm afraid. The high-quality Asus and MSI motherboards are, of course, assembled in China. However, it is my understanding that the high-quality capacitors and some of the other vital components in the boards are manufactured in Japan.

The revision 3 boards -- with the cougar point SATA issue resolved -- have been in short supply since...well, up to now. I was anticipating several months of supply -- oversupply, specifically -- to knock down the price of the boards, some of which are selling _above_ MSRP -- particularly the Asus P8P67 Pro. From what I understand, Asus, MSI, gigabyte, and the rest are having enough trouble just getting boards to folks that RMA'd their original boards, which is why so few are in the retail channel.

That, of course, leads me to the fear that the Japan-related supply shortage shoe has yet to drop. Kind of sucks.

Then again, I didn't loose my house...

What about quality?

[jackd]

This could easily have extended consequences for the quality of the devices that are put in the market over the next 1-6 months. New possibly untested stopgap suppliers, providing technology condensed sensitive parts. This won't just affect Apple, many manufacturers will get hit by this. Would be interesting to see stats for returns from some of these companies over the next few months.