Global Chip Shortage Threatens Production of Laptops, Smartphones and More (reuters.com) 29
Makers of cars and electronic devices from TVs to smartphones are sounding alarm bells about a global shortage of chips, which is causing manufacturing delays as consumer demand bounces back from the coronavirus crisis. From a report: The problem has several causes, industry executives and analysts say, including bulk-buying by U.S. sanctions-hit Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies, a fire at a chip plant in Japan, coronavirus lockdowns in Southeast Asia, and a strike in France. More fundamentally, however, there has been under-investment in 8-inch chip manufacturing plants owned mostly by Asian firms, which means they have struggled to ramp up production as demand for 5G phones, laptops and cars picked up faster than expected. "For the whole electronics industry, we've been experiencing a shortage of components," said Donny Zhang, CEO of Shenzhen-based sourcing company Sand and Wave, who said he faced delays in obtaining a microcontroller unit that was key to a smart headphone product he was working on. "We were originally planning to complete production in one month, but now it looks like we'll need to do it in two." A source at a Japanese electronics component supplier said it was seeing shortages of WiFi and Bluetooth chips and was expecting delays of more than 10 weeks.
Shortage of chips? (Score:1)
How come Lay's is unaffected? The supermarkets seem fully stocked.
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Do yourself a favor and track down "all dressed" flavor chips. Canada has been keeping this flavor a secret and it's finally crossed the border. Best flavor hands down.
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It's a conspiracy! (Re:Shortage of chips?) (Score:3)
I blame the ethanol fuel subsidy. It's driving up demand for corn and making tortillas and other corn based chips more expensive and driving more people to eat potato chips. I blame the Republicans for this. Then there's the Democrats subsidizing high fructose corn syrup, making corn even more expensive.
I'm sure the Russians are involved, with all their vodka drinking. The French eating their French fries. The Belgians and their waffles. The Jews have something to do with it too, I just haven't made t
8 inch (Score:1)
You're boring if you didn't giggle at least a little
I giggled, but I'm not funny so hopefully someone else can make a good joke with it.
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I knew that Japan was good at miniaturizing things, but I had no idea they had gotten chip manufacturing plants that small.
Smells like PR (Score:1)
I fully realize that supply chains have been disrupted, but there's been nine months to re-secure and plan product deliveries.
Often, these stories are designed to keep prices artificially high, like the scare on commodity goods like toilet paper, and even eggs.
The sad part about the US, the leader in COVID infections and deaths, is that business are continuing to try to push forward, and the legislatures have enormous difficulties getting their second round of funding offsets decided.
Still, stinks of messag
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Here we go again (Score:2)
When our contract changed from Lenovo to HP almost 2 years ago, we had multi-week delays getting our new machines in because, we were told, of a chip shortage (Intel).
Now here we are again, hearing the same excuses from private industry about why they can't do what they're being paid to do. At this point, any order which is delayed should get a discounted price which is eaten by the manufacturer or chip maker, or both.
Considering all the taxpayer money these companies have received and most likely continue
Re:Here we go again (Score:4)
No, I state facts [ariat-tech.com]. And this has been going on for some time [nytimes.com].
But facts don't matter [nikkei.com], do they, especially in this country [caixinglobal.com].
Gets even worse when... (Score:2)
At the end of the day though, chip shortages like this should serve as a reminder to lazy software developers that they might not have customers if they do not properly optimise for the lowest possible common denominator.
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Now here we are again, hearing the same excuses from private industry . . .
You do understand that Intel’s very public problems in manufacturing CPUs for the last several years is not related to the overall industry’s struggles right now? For Intel their 10nm and now 7nm is beset with ongoing yield problems. Industry wide, other companies are experiencing other problems are the articles mentions. Calling them excuses when they are the exact reason makes it seem there is some secret conspiracy occurring against you.
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At this point, any order which is delayed should get a discounted price which is eaten by the manufacturer or chip maker, or both.
This is like having to wait for a new car because there is a tire shortage. You want either Ford or Firestone to give you a discount because you can't buy the new car you want within the time frame you deem acceptable?
If Home Depot says a popular model of refrigerator is back ordered, do you demand a discount? They can't fulfill the orders they currently have so why would they give you a discount? Either you wait like everyone else, or you purchase something else.
Walk into Best Buy, Walmart, or Game
Cause of the shortage... (Score:2, Funny)
The chip companies had to ramp up production of the RFID chips going into all of the covid-19 vaccines, so they weren't able to keep up with the other demands...
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I knew it!
Next thing you know "they" will be putting tracking devices in our cars, our phones, our wristwatches, our television sets, and our running shoes.
(It's impossible to make any parody today. There's simply nothing that is beyond belief any more.)
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That's been true since they started selling razors with 5 blades, a notion first presented in the pages of MAD Magazine back in the 70s.
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This is why I keep setting off the alarms when I leave the store. Dang vaccine chips trying to track how often I leave my house.
Extend existing chips (Score:3)
but is it real? (Score:2)
is there a real shortage or are they holding back in order to raise prices. I just don't trust tech companies. Too many times, imo, they hold back in order to create demand and profit.
Is there a market solution to this? I see two. (Score:2)
Working in IT I see a lot of computers get replaced only because they are declared "too old". The computers work, they aren't likely to fail anytime soon, and the software the people need still runs on these "too old" computers. It's just that there is an expectation that people are "supposed" to get a new computer every three years. I'm no accountant but I can recall there being some tax incentive to buying new hardware at this rate. I recall hearing some places reduced this replacement rate to every f
My computer is over twelve years old (Score:2)
I did have to replace the mother board twice. Three CPUs. Memory. The power supply. New graphics card. Several disk drives and now a large SSD.
But that box and CD burner just keep working.
(This is actually true.)
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Replacing CPU, motherboard, RAM, etc. is still considered new a PC. :) My home PCs are over a decade old with mostly the same hardwares (CPUs, motherboards, etc.).
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I saw this with Cisco that only kept their computers for three years and then force to exchange for new faster ones. I didn't want to upgrade since they were fine and too much hassles to do them remotely since I just got them used for a year! They should had given me the new upgraded ones when I started my 1.5 years contract job!
A strike in France (Score:2)
The problem has several causes, industry executives and analysts say, including (..) a strike in France
That news made me discover France had electronic chip production capacity. This is STMicroelectronics [wikipedia.org], a legacy of former state-owner Thomson firm
Generational improvements (Score:2)
I do a mix of refurbishing and replacing of my computers to keep them up do date.
For most laptops, replacing a mechanical drive with an SSD (even an old and small one) makes a huge difference. Once that is done, upgrading RAM (if not soldered!), replacing battery gives a good life upgrade.
Intel CPUs no longer have generational upgrade benefits. So keeping an 6th gen might still be viable, but anything older than 4th gen (4790K for desktop) should be replaced. It is hard to justify running those.
GPUs make up