Rambus Production Capacity Switched to Make SDRAM

Jon Rabone writes " NEC, Japan's largest chipmaker is halting Rambus production to make SDRAM. Both NEC and Samsung are to switch production over to SDRAM - sounds to me like RAMBUS could be in danger of dying the death, after Intel's latest problems with the Camino chipset. At least we might see SDRAM prices fall again. "

Comments

Law of Supply and Demand

[Jack William Bell]

Need I say more?

Jack

Re:Law of Supply and Demand

[justin_saunders]

Umm. I think its the Law Of Don't Waste Money On Dead Technology.

cheers,
Justin.

It figures

[ed_the_unready]

This decision, and the corresponding drop in SDRAM prices, was made inevitable by my purchase of a 128 meg upgrade for my server *just yesterday*.
---------------------

Re:It figures

[jhughes]

I know how ya feel, they lowered the prices on Pentium IIIs just two days AFTER I bought mine.....

Re:It figures

[jued0001]

I know what you're saying. I just built a computer at home, bought a 128MB PC100 chip last week (for a hundred dollars less than ZDNet reported them being by the way), and now the start producing them again?!?! The same thing happened when I bought 32MB of RAM for my 486/66 half a decade ago. Makes me want to cry. -------------------------------------------------- "I like stories."-Homer Simpson

Odd inconsistancies

[irishmikev]

The odd thing is that the usually more expensive venues to buy RAM (best buy, comp usa, etc) were as lately as a week ago offering rebates on RAM that made it about a buck a meg. Computer shows which usually have the better deal were charging 100 bucks for a 64 MB dimm the same weekend. Kind of strange. Of course, the number of people who may actually see those rebates could be very small....

Re:Odd inconsistancies

[whaley]

I know from computer stores here in The Netherlands that most stores keep their prices
artificially high in order to keep a buffer for
when things like this happens. This means they
overcharge you when the price could be low, but
they also give a fair price when it temporarily
goes up. However, in this case I noticed that
one Dutch store, Paradigit has stopped selling DRAMS because they want to use their supply for installing in complete systems.

Re:Odd inconsistancies

[garver]

Keep watching CompUSA. I'm betting that their price will go up and stay up long after the computer shows go back down. It has always seemed to me that the stores lag a couple weeks (months?) behind when it comes to price changes. The RAM they are selling you was probably bought weeks ago and has finally made its way through their distribution channel to the store.

Interesting point though. An enterprising individual could take advantage of this and make some clean cash.

Re:I hope SDRAM prices fall..

[j a w a d]

A few months ago the rule of thumb was a buck (US$) a meg (MB). Now it's easily $2 a meg, and in some cases $3.

RAM prices fluctuate like this every year.

[Wakko Warner]

The best time of the year to buy, I've found, has always been in the middle of the year. Prices, for the past few years, seem to bottom out in June, and then slowly rise to peak in October/November. They should start dropping like a brick soon and, by the middle of next year, you'll wonder why you ever spent $80 for 128 megs of SDRAM when it's $40 now.

- A.P.
--

"One World, one Web, one Program" - Microsoft promotional ad

Re:RAM prices fluctuate like this every year.

[Otto]

The best time of the year to buy, I've found, has always been in the middle of the year. Prices, for the past few years, seem to bottom out in June, and then slowly rise to peak in October/November. They should start dropping like a brick soon and, by the middle of next year, you'll wonder why you ever spent $80 for 128 megs of SDRAM when it's $40 now.

I would have no problem spending $80 for 128 megs. I do have a problem spending $231 for the same 128 megs. That is the lowest price on pricewatch as I write this.

"Our prices are INSANE!!!!"

---

Re:I hope SDRAM prices fall..

[Bartmoss]

100%? Lucky person.
I bought a 128MB RAM bar for 220 DM about 3 months ago. Now they are listed at 660 DM (2 days ago).

1 US$ = about DM 1.8

...

[BradyB]

I guess these businesses can't wait forever for Intel to get their act together. They seem to have been having a rough time of it lately. Is AMD planning on using this Rambus type chip by any chance or is that Intel specific stuff.

Death of Rambus?

[scumdamn]

This makes me just as happy as Linux's market share growth. I love seeing Intel get humiliated like this! For years I've been saying that Intel is the MS of chip manufacturing, and now they've shot themselves in the foot. It's about damn time!
Maybe Win2000 will be the Rambus of Microsoft?

Re:Death of Rambus?

[Anonymous Coward]

This ought to be about more than Intel being humiliated. Intel should be stopped from forcing a more expensive, ill-planned and "sole-proprietor" technology on the PC buyers of the world; and if the revolt of .tw suppliers does not suffice DOJ should see what they can find in an investigation. (I think they should start on it now. Yes, the motherboardf makers are in revolt, but they're not in a very good position to bargain at the moment due to quake. Plus DOJ should uphold principle here and not wait until all the damage is done an irreversible)

The premise of Rambus is much stronger for ultra high end server machines than for general use PC's. But Intel has been shoving Rambus down everyone's throats to finance the costs of their push into the Enterprise. If this isn't an example of leveraging monopoly power then I don't know anything that could be fairly called a monopoly: the increased cost (damage to consumers) is inarguably real and dollar-figure obvious. As is Intel's control over the "standard". They're so obsessed with this goal that little things that affect "the little people" like the design flaw of the i820 slip by.

The reason? Volume.

[Wakko Warner]

CompUSA probably has a warehouse full of RAM they bought back when prices were low. They can afford to sell it at the prices they're selling it at now and still make a huge profit because they bought it so cheaply back then. Little RAM dealers (like the kind of people you see at computer shows and on Pricewatch) buy tiny fractions of what CompUSA buys, and they tend not to have any overstock sitting around, so they *must* charge more, because they're paying today's prices, not the price RAM was in June.

As always, it's best to look at all the options before you buy stuff -- don't always just head on over to pricewatch and think you've gotten a great deal. :)

- A.P. (speaking of great deals, checked the prices for 18 gig U2W scsi drives lately?)
--

"One World, one Web, one Program" - Microsoft promotional ad

Mandated technology

[overshoot]

• Not really surprising. Engineering by fiat fails if trumped by a Higher Authority (e.g., physics)
  
• The problem isn't the Camino chip, it's the physics. Turns out that Rambus has a major signal-integrity failure mode that sort of got swept under the rug until the systems houses got bit by it.
  
• The DRAM companies never liked Rambus, but had their arms twisted by Intel. Now they have a chance to bail and are taking it.
  
• The comment about DDR (double-data-rate SDRAM) having no standard will come as quite a surprise to the people at the memory companies and in particular JEDEC's JC-42 memory committee, which thinks that they have issued one, and AMII, which is sponsored by the memory industry (including NEC and Samsung) to promote its use.

Re:Mandated technology

[Anonymous Coward]

Not really surprising. Engineering by fiat fails if trumped by a Higher Authority (e.g., physics)

If only that was always true. Intel has been successful pretty often with inferior solutions. It's just this time they're trying to push around a few large companies rather than a larger collection of smaller companies. There are a bunch of companies that make (should I use the word assemble now?) motherboards that Intel pushed around with their (at the time) inferior chipsets, but very few companies can afford the investment to start making RAM.

fiat: This reminds me of a Pontiac commercial where they say "Wider is better." Now, Intel is promoting "Slower is better." Guess what? Wider is better, but slower isn't. Therefore, RAMBUS is out. Intel can argue that significantly slowing down RAM in order to decrease the pin count is a good thing, but most consumers don't understand that so they'll go with the faster and cheap DRAM.

Re:Mandated technology

[SimonK]

Its frankly embarassing how long this stuff has taken to pan out. It must have been three or four years ago - when SDRAM was just going into production, and not long after Intel had started trumpeting RAMBUS - that many systems houses came out and set "there is no way this can be manufactured".

Its a testment to Intel's unprecedented power and the weakness of engineering arguments in this kind of decision making that this thing has lived as long as it has.

Thank god

[Otto]

Now hopefully I'll be able to afford the RAM I need for my new system before X-mas.

It's always the way isn't it? RAM stays so cheap for so long, then I finally start building my system and prices go through the roof. Then, as they're starting to drop again, Taiwan has an earthquake, pushing RAM prices up further (Even if they haven't peaked because of that, they will).. Just perfect. And I refuse to buy RAM for more than a buck a meg.

argh...

---

Re:Thank god

[KBrown]

> And I refuse to buy RAM for more than a buck a meg.

This fall of prices is the best I've heared in a month, prices have been almost $2US/M and I am definitely not paying that huge amount of money because three months ago I purchased the same 128M dimms at $0.8US/M.

I hope memory prices fall below $0.5US/M so I can buy other 256M for my machine.

Blame it on the quake...

[daVinci1980]

Actually, I totally disagree with this statement for this year

The reason the prices got so high this year was because of the quake in Taiwan. Most of the chips that you put in your PC were manufactured in Taiwan, and a lot of the major chip manufacturers suffered serious losses in the quake and the aftermath.

Although many of the chipmakers did come out alright, just the fear of the chip shortage drove prices sky-high.

This is not unlike what happens in other industries, for example oil. A few months ago, I could put gas in my car for less than a dollar a gallon. The first time it has ever happened in my life. For a while, I could even find it for $.93US a gallon. But then there was a teeny-tiny little oil scare, (thanks Saddam!) and BAM! oil prices sky-rocket. It costs me $1.25US per gallon now, if I'm lucky!

I do agree that prices tend to fluctuate a bit every year, but that's to be expected. Prices on most commodities fluctuate according to some calendar. This year is not a typical fluctuation for memory prices. Or any other chip prices that begin to take a rise of 50%-150%.


--
"A mind is a horrible thing to waste. But a mime...
It feels wonderful wasting those fsckers."

Re:Blame it on the quake...

[spencerogden]

If I remember correctly, RAM prices were already skyrocketing before the quake. The quake has of course compounded the problem, but RAM had already double in price by the time the quake happened.

Re:Blame it on the quake...

[Miguelito]

Then the prices skyrocketed, and I'm paying almost $1.20/gallon nowadays.

Sheesh.. Gas prices in San Diego have been well above $1.20 for regular unleaded for years now. It's about $1.30 now, and that's the lowest it's been for awhile.

I'm 26 now, and I don't think I've paid less than a $1/gal for gas for about 8 or 9 years... in San Diego anyway. We get screwed here. Whenever I travel to places for work or vacation I get to see that _everywhere_ else is cheaper.... ARGH!

Re:Blame it on the quake...

[Schnedt]

Nope. Can't blame it on the quake. The prices were up by a factor of four from the July low by a week before the earthquake in Japan.

So it's because of other factors. A wafer shortage is what I had heard.

Re:Blame it on the quake...

[Rombuu]

Ok then, how come when GM goes on strike for a few weeks the price of their vehicles don't jump by 400%? Huh?

Um, because this doesn't effect the supply of cars from Ford, Crysler, Audi, BMW, etc. etc. etc...

Try reading an economic text sometime...

Samsung already switched

[Jacco de Leeuw]

A while back, The Register reported that "Samsung shut down Rambus production and shifted to SDRAM production until Intel can come up with a new Camino launch date".

Re:I hope SDRAM prices fall..

[twit]

I bought a 128Mb stick of SDRAM for $100 Canadian (~= 69$US) at the absolute bottom market; I'm glad I did. Admittedly, that was a used purchase, but the multiplier in the great white north was about .75$US per meg for new RAM.

--

RAM prices are already falling again

[Tet]

I bought my 128MB DIMM for 54 pounds sterling about 2 months ago. A week later, they'd dropped to 49, and then prices went through the roof. Last week they were up to 198 pounds (about US$317), but have now starting falling back down again, and are at 167 today. That said, I was quoted up to 245 pounds wandering round the shops in Tottenham Court Road on Saturday. All prices exclude VAT at 17.5%.

From looking at other posts, I guess memory in the US is still dirt cheap (at least compared to our prices in the UK)

Good and bad news

[R. Anthony]

Hopefully SDRAM prices will drop as a result of this, as a lot of companies stopped fabricating DRAM back in June as a result of the overabundance of cheap Taiwanese DRAM selling at $4. I'd personally like to see SDRAM fall back to somewhat more reasonable level as $360 is not a fair price IMHO for a 128 MB DIMM when the production cost is marginally less (300%).

However. SDRAM won't suffice forever as it can't (disclaimer: as far as I know) be overclocked much higher than it already is (140 MHz is the highest I've read about before stability issues arise). RDRAM on the other hand can run up to 800 MHz. The heat sync looks rather cute, but the memory is tragically flawed by it's miniscule 16 bit bus (as opposed to the 64 bit SDRAM bus to the front side system bus).

Rambus really needs to go back to the drawing board on this before they bring it back to market, if it is ever given another chance. Intel in partnering with Rambus was seeing Large dollar signs in an unending stream of royalty payments on every future RDRAM RIMM sold for many years to come. Chalk it up to another case of greed overriding sensibility.

Re:Good and bad news

[tak amalak]

What you said about SDRAM is correct. But there are companies that will be producing DDR-SDRAM (Double Data Rate SDRAM) that can send signals up and down a cycle, effectively doubling the clock rate to 200-266MHz (depending on if they are using PC100 or PC133 chips).
Benefits:
* 64bit memory throughput to the system
* Much lower latency than RAMBUS
* Uses tested SDRAM technology
* Can be easily implemented in cheaper systems
* Has 2.1GBps max transfer rate compared to 1.6GBps on 800MHz RAMBUS
* Still has headroom to grow
--

Re:Good and bad news

[RelliK]

RDRAM on the other hand can run up to 800 MHz.

RDRAM can NOT run at 800 MHz. It runs at 400 MHz at the most, but it's rated at 800 because it can transfer data at both the rising and falling edge of the cylce. This is exactly what DDR DRAM will do. It's basically the same as SDRAM except for this very feature. And you don't have to pay any royalties.

Although the maximum transfer rate of RDRAM is 1600 Mb/s (compared to 800 MB/s of 100 MHz SDRAM), its latency is much higher (because it can only transfer 16 bits at a time). And for 90% of the applications, latency is the limiting factor, not burst transfer rate. This is exactly why you see almost no difference between Celeron and PII, even though Celeron has 66 MHz bus while PII has 100Mhz.

Re:Good and bad news

[hazydave]

>RDRAM on the other hand can run up to 800 MHz. The heat sync looks rather cute, but the memory >is tragically flawed by it's miniscule 16 bit bus (as opposed to the 64 bit SDRAM bus to the front side system bus). If you take a look, you'll find that the 64-bit FSB on today's P6 machines is simply a reaction to this architectural feature of the P6 bus. The SDRAM chips themselves are usually 8 or 16-bit wide devices, ganged to deliver a 64-bit bus. You can't do this same ganging on Rambus as easily, but you can certainly support several Rambus channels for fewer controller chip pins than you need for a 64-bit SDRAM bus. Today, it's not necessary -- a 100MHz P6 bus is only going to use about 1/2 the bandwidth of one Rambus channel. So this is not the doom you think. What Rambus buys for Intel, more than anything, is an easy way to move memory off the P6 bus. This will allow more I/O efficient system chips, as PCI and AGP now can have a direct channel to memory that doesn't get directly in the way of P6 activity. So even if the PIII can only use 800-900MB/s on the 1600MB/s Rambus channel, with proper buffering in the North Bridge chip, AGP and PCI will get a piece of this without conflicting as much with the CPU. This is also what you get with the EV6 bus, though in this case, by definition. And of course, Rambus isn't the only way. You can get the same bandwith with one Direct Rambus channel, a 64-bit DDR-SDRAM bus, or a 128-bit SDRAM bus (a staple on Alpha machines for years). The problem is doubling this. Two Direct Rambus channels are practically a no-brainer. 128-bit bus SDRAM-DDR might be possible in modern BGA packaging, but it's cutting it close. A 256-bit plain old SDRAM bus is not going to happen in commodity PCs. Now double it again. This is why Intel's been interested in Rambus.

Many reasons for increase

[JediLuke]

man, there were so many factors that jacked it up to over $2 a meg from $.50 a meg

1. Micron lost a months batch
   
2. Micron's lawsuit
   
3. Intel's frickin RAMBUS delays
   

we were doing just fine before that...we should trade memory on the commodities market
JediLuke

Re:Many reasons for increase

[R. Anthony]

4. Micron's aquisition of Texas Instruments
5. Tariff wall erected against Taiwanese DRAM
6. Micron's Monopoly over US DRAM market
7. Taiwan's frequent power outages (3 total before quake)

Re:Many reasons for increase

[Sehnsucht]

TARIFF AGAINST TAIWAN!??!
*stomps around in anger*

Dumb politicians, only hurt us..
(But not them - obviously as usually the majority
is in the pockets of the industr[y|ies]!)

Re:I hope SDRAM prices fall..

[Mr_Ust]

Hehe.. You've got to be kidding.. For 100Mhz RAM at least, I know prices have gone up 400% since just a few months ago.. (And I know, because I was forced to pay the full price) :(

so, this mean there will be more R&D?

[dAzED1]

I want some 200mhz memory, so it'll actually be "syncronous" to the athlon I'll be getting soon.

wonder when that will happen.

Re:so, this mean there will be more R&D?

[overshoot]

Via has a DDR-200/266 chipsetfor the K7 on the ramp right now. The memories are shipping but not on the shelves due to lack of sockets. (All new SDRAM parts are actually DDR with a bond-out option)

Re:so, this mean there will be more R&D?

[overshoot]

An AC asked,
What is a bond-out option?

Integrated circuits are little rectangles of silicon and have to be connected to the rest of the world. On the chip itself there are exposed metal spots ("bond pads") connected to the device's I/O circuitry. Various means are used to connect the bond pads to the package, but the most common are veeeery thin gold wires attached to the chip at one end and a package conductor at the other.

Since it's inconvenient and expensive to maintain separate IC designs, it's often easier to have one design which can be used in multiple ways depending on external signals, jumpers, or whatever. Rather than bring these configuration lines out of the package, though, they can be connected internally at the time the bond wires are attached. Likewise, signals that aren't needed in a particular configuration can be left out of the package I/O set.

HTH.

Re:Blame it on the quake... Wrong

[webslacker]

RAM prices were going insanely high even before the quake. The quake sent them up a notch, but I recall seeing 128MB DIMM's at Fry's Electronics for $200 even before the Taiwan quake hit. Hopefully, NEC's switch back to SDRAM will bring them back to the $65-$100 price range we saw before.

Re:Blame it on the quake?

[R. Anthony]

The reason the prices got so high this year was because of the quake in Taiwan.

Not so. I was following the market closely before during and after the quake. I used corsair PC 133 128 MB as a marker, as it uses Micron DRAM which is not produced in Taiwan, and in no way would be effected by the quake (it also happend to be the brand I choose and now own, due to it's superior quality). Here is a timeline of the price spikes:

I chose direct.multiwave.com (wholesaler) as my test bed.

Monday (prior to quake): $297

Sept 22nd (day of the quake, wednesday): $297

Sept 24th $297

Sept 29th: $358

Oct 7th: $372

So you see, the prices were already at $300 before the quake. The subsequent rises could be attributed to Micron raising the price of DRAM to over $16 after the 22th, the day of the quake.

makes up my mind

[Bocephus]

If anyone was having an argument with themselves whether to get a K--er, Athlon or a 133MHz PIII, I think this pretty much eliminates the viability of the 133MHz PIII.

AMD

[Dr. Evil]

I heard from an unreliable source (a slashdot comment some time ago) that RAMBUS was pointless in systems with busses around 100MHz... that it only really shone at 200MHz... which coincidentally was the bus speed of the K7. Since RamBUS was an Intel technology, they were inadvertently helping a competitor by promoting this technology.

Does anyone care to confirm or refute this?

Re:AMD

[overshoot]

• Rambus isn't an Intel technology, although they are pushing it.
  
• AMD is _not_ using Rambus for the K7. All of the announced K7 north-bridge chips (most notably Via's) are strictly DDR SDRAM designs.
  
• for fun reading on the subject of Rambus performance compared to old, slow, PC100 SDRAM check out the Dell benchmarks.
  

Re:AMD

[hazydave]

AMD _had not yet_ used Rambus for the K7. In fact, they haven't used any memory at all -- they system chips they currently offer are licensed from Via, and support only support single data phase SDRAM, not DDR-SDRAM. They have licensed Rambus. You can read about it at http://www.amd.com/news/prodpr/9890.html, http://www.ebnonline.com/digest/story/OEG19981008S 0002, http://www.techweb.com/wire/story/TWB19981012S0015 , and plenty of other places. I suspect they're waiting on Intel and plentiful RIMM supplies before releasing this, it's technology so far unproven in a PC yet. Also, AMD needs to bring system-chip technology in-house, especially now that they're potentially in competition on the CPU side with VIA. And, in fact, as the benchmarks you found show, Rambus bridged to a 100MHz P6 bus is no great shakes -- there's more latency than SDRAM, but it can't possible reach the CPU any faster than SDRAM can. Do the math. However, it can result in an overall faster system performance, especially if you're stressing the AGP bus, IF they built a good North Bridge architecture to support this. I have no idea if Intel did this or not in the i820. On a 200MHz FSB, things are very different; even with the latency issues, the fully effective transfer rate is doubled over regular SDRAM, and it can still benefit from the enhanced architectural tricks possible in the North Bridge. But you do need some newer ideas to fully benefit from Rambus, and I rather suspect Intel's first Rambus controllers are about as good as their first PCI controllers were. Even so, they can't use the performance today. AMD could. And in fact, AMD needs to support the K7 with a real 200MHz memory system of some kind if they hope to get a really significant performance lead over Intel. Hopefully they will, whether its DDR-SDRAM, 128-bit SDRAM, or Rambus.

like Betamax vs. VHS...

[MoNsTeR]

Only this time it looks like Beta gets to win! IIRC, Beta was the superior video tape technology, but VHS had the muscle of Sony behind it, so it won eventually, despite its technical inferiority. For a while, I feared the same would happen with Rambus: it's truly a crappy RAM arch, offering little to no performance gains (in some cases, losses) while bringing sky-high prices, proprietarty design and royalties to Rambus. But it has Intel trying to push it through...
Lucky for us, the RAM manufacturers, motherboard manufacturers, IHV's (look at Micron's decision to dump Intel chipsets), and best of all, CONSUMERS, have figured out that Intel and Rambus are trying to screw us here, and we won't stand for it.
The day DDR SDRAM is available at a reasonable price, the last nail will be in Rambus' coffin!

MoNsTeR

Re:like Betamax vs. VHS...

[geocajun]

Well your wrong about your beta vs. VHS argument.

I really like to use this as a parallel to open source and why it works.

Beta kept there product closed and proprietary while VHS sold their product for nothing and released all the specs to anyone who wanted them saying clone us and sell your product please!
The small video stores had their shelves loaded with VHS VCR's while having just one, if any beta VCR's.
Beta truly was superior to VHS so I want to end the parallel to open source right there...

Re:Blame it on the quake?

[Dr. Evil]

Just to be redundant, I can confirm this, about three weeks before the quake, I went to go buy an SDRAM, the place I went to was out of stock... the next weekend, prices had doubled and were still climbing. Many companies in my area refused to sell or carry RAM, then the quake hit.

I heard from a somewhat reliable source that this has to do with a major SDRAM manufacturer going bankrupt. I haven't been able to confirm this through any channels though. I suppose with all the competition and the economic crisis in Asia, even a high volume manufacturer of SDRAM can go bankrupt... it makes sense, but again, I have no confirmation of this story.

Re:Rambus will not die

[overshoot]

Hate to break the news, but the problem isn't really with the Camino north bridge chip. It's a signal integrity problem with the Rambus system architecture. Nasty combination of crosstalk and a resonant mode in the data lines that takes received data out of signaling spec (the line fails to cross above the logic threshold when the RAM is sending a HIGH.)
Intel is taking the fall on this one as though it's a silicon problem because it doesn't really matter where the problem is, the 820-based product isn't going to ship. Inside of Intel there's a big bloodletting going on between the engineers and the suits, because the suits are having a hard time dealing with the concept that there are some things that can't be changed by management fiat and the engineers aren't real amused by egos under the delusion that they can order back the tide.
There's been some good discussion on this over on SI-LIST

Latest prices (pricewatch.com)

[Anonymous Coward]

From pricewatch.com, as of about 10 minutes ago;

PC133 256MB $579 to $ 749 - $2.26 to $2.93 per meg.
PC133 128MB $252 to $ 298 - $1.97 to $2.33 per meg.

PC100 512MB $999 to $2250 - $1.95 to $4.39 per meg.
PC100 256MB $481 to $ 564 - $1.88 to $2.20 per meg.
PC100 128MB $231 to $ 253 - $1.80 to $1.98 per meg.
PC100 64MB $117 to $ 131 - $1.83 to $2.05 per meg.
PC100 32MB $ 47 to $ 73 - $1.47 to $2.28 per meg.

Method: All data in $ (USD) from the first 15 prices reported.
Averages rounded to the nearest cent. Quality and type not
factored in.

Don't read too much into this.

[hazydave]

Actually, AMD recently took a Rambus licence. Which only made sense once they had a system chip architecture (licensed from VIA, possibly a competitor now that VIA has bough the high-end Cyrix stuff). Clearly, the Rambus retreat is based on Intel's inability to get their new i820 chipset working properly. They were counting on this to make a big splash for Christmastime, and so anyone making Direct Rambus likely has stockpiles already. Knowing that's not going to happen, it makes perfect sense they're running SDRAM now, especially with the rise in SDRAM pricing. After all, the main allure of Direct Rambus for the memory vendors was higher margins. You can get that now, at least for a little while, with SDRAM, and there's no sense in making more Rambus now. Rambus itself has been proven in the consumer maket -- the Nintendo 64 uses the original 8-bit Rambus design, at 500MHz (technically, 250MHz DDR). The interesting thing is that Intel can't use Rambus anyway, now; they're priming the pumps for some future migration. One 16-bit Direct Rambus at 800MHz (technically, 400MHz DDR) peaks out at 1600MB/s, but a 100MHz P6 bus peaks out at 800MB/s. Sure, they'll run it up to 133MHz in the i820 (VIA has a 133MHz P6 bus chipset already), but it's not something you need Rambus for. AMD, on the other hand, has this hot EV6 bus. They're running it at 200MHz, but it's already going 400MHz in Alpha machines. It's kind of silly to run this on a PC100 bus. So AMD can actually take full advantage of one Direct Rambus channel. In fact, if they want to boost I/O performance, two channels wouldn't be out of line. Of course, AMD could get to a real 200MHz data rate using 100MHz DDR SDRAM (supposedly ALi is doing an EV6 chipset to support this). So they don't really need Direct Rambus, either. Unless they're planning a 400MHz FSB migration, too...

BETA WAS SONY! VHS WAS EVERYONE ELSE!

[gonar]

beta was sony's proprietary vcr format and yes, it was better in some ways.

the reasons it lost to vhs were primarily:

1. sony wanted a buttload in license fees
2. sony would not allow pornographic movies to be distributed on beta
3. vhs was an open standard, which anyone could build to, royalty free.
4. porn producers didn't have to run their product by sony's corporate censors

Re:BETA WAS SONY! VHS WAS EVERYONE ELSE!

[Dastardly]

And, the parallels to Intel/Rambus are hard to ignore.

1) Rambus wants a buttload in license fees.

2) SDRAM, DDR-SDRAM are open standards which anyone can build to, royalty free. (There may be some minor royalties, but these are negotiated or worked around by JEDEC.)

and, one you didn't mention that applies to beta vs vhs and rambus vs ddr.

3) The performance difference is not noticeable by the average consumer.

So, you end up with a marginally better technology, that is more than marginally more expensive. Which is a recipe for disaster in the PC industry. Another point to note is that proprietary hardware has never suceeded in the PC space. Examples:

1) MCA vs ISA - IBM got spanked ont his one even though MCA was the better technology.

2) Apple/Mac vs IBM compatible - Apple and MacOS had superior software and hardware, but got spanked by the open hardware PC.

3) Soundblaster compatible devices - While I am sure there were better alternatives, for some reason everything was soundblaster compatible.

I am sure more coudl be named, but I don't have time.

Dastardly

The prices isn't that bad..

[arcade]

The prices isn't that bad. If you care to take a look backwards in time, the prices nowadays are extremely cheap. I remember forking out $200 for 4 new megabytes of RAM 6 years ago. And - remember after that epoxy fabric in .. was it taiwan burned some .. 5-6 years ago? The prices was $200 for *one* megabyte of ram at the worst.

So, this isn't *expensive*. It's just 'bad luck' that you didn't buy when ram was a tad cheaper.

--

Re:The prices isn't that bad..

[Schnedt]

It's just 'bad luck' that you didn't buy when ram was a tad cheaper.

A tad cheaper???

I bought a 128 M SIMM (PC-100) this summer for $79. The same SIMM from the same dealer is now over $300. Luckily I bought enough (two more) for my new system when the price was $110. I pissed and moaned then (because it had been $79 a few weeks earlier) but don't regret spending the money now.

I remember back when I paid $2 for 256Kx1bit RAM chips (they were used, desoldered-from-equipment parts) and how I later regretted not buying as many as I could afford, when the same used chips were going for $12 each. Back then 640K was pretty darn expensive for us poor suckers and our 8088 system boards with hungry IC sockets.

Kids these days... thumping along on crutch...

Prices on TCR suck anyway...

[YuppieScum]

...and always have.

If you're in that area on a Saturday, check out the computer fair just off TCR. It's held in a hotel on the first side street to the right, just up from the Oxford Street/TCR junction. (Can't be more accurate 'cos it's 18 months since I was there last)

Good range and prices, and one set of guys who test all memory in front of you before you take it away.

Re:Blame it on the quake?

[Sun Tzu]

Imagine for a moment that a catastrophe destroyed *all* the memory production capacity except that from a single company. By your logic, that one company's prices shouldn't be affected by the disaster. Of course, that cannot be.

If the quake affected Micron's competition it affected Micron's market. If it affected Micron's market, it stands to affect Micron's prices.

The reality of markets is, of course, far more complicated than your argument (and mine) would have it be. Even a credible prediction of a quake in Taiwan would affect prices in the markets in which Taiwan is a major player.

RAM Price Increase

[Nicodemas]

My understanding is that RAM prices began to rise because several of the major RAM manufacturers were 'retooling' to go from 64bit chips to 128bit chips. During this period, prices rose to slow the sale of existing RAM, as apposed to the potential nightmare of running out (As well as to exploit a situation and make more money). The quake in Taiwan only exasperated the problem, because the only major players that hadn't begun retooling were in (you guessed it) Taiwan. And of course, Christmas is coming and that always drives the price of electronics up.

Toms hardware called this correctly months ago

[SurfsUp]

After reading Tom's in-depth analysis of RAMBUS vs SDRAM months ago, I concluded that RAMBUS was a zombie duck...

Thanks Tom, for getting it right *once again*

Re:Blame it on the quake... [OffTopic]

[ender-]

For a while, I could even find it for $.93US a gallon. But then there was a teeny-tiny little oil scare, (thanks Saddam!) and BAM! oil prices sky-rocket. It costs me $1.25US per gallon now, if I'm lucky!

Hell, $1.25 is cheap. It's running $1.69 here now :(

Ender

Re:Blame it on the quake?

[Reziac]

Not only that, but acto all the reports I've seen, the quake only downed about 10% of production, and they expected to be back at full production in about 2 weeks.

Worst price fluctuation I saw was 128mb PC100 going from $103 to $480. Where do I find a bank that will figure 10% interest like this? :)

FYI

[Trousersnake]

FYI
Beta is still in use in the "Industry"

Its all about porn

[[kilroy]]

VHS the battle because the Porn industry supported it. Why do you think the Video CD failed? You would be hard pressed to find any recent North American porn on it. Asia is a differnt story all-together. You can look through any old smut mags that had ads in the back for video's (like Huster, Cheri) and if you count up how many betas can you find as compaired to VHS's? (and don't count the places that send you a slide projector or a reel to reel projector...)


Lets face it, in porn quality doesn't really matter, as long as your not asking your self the question "Is that a nipple or an anus?"

Re:Its all about porn

[mrogers]

Lets face it, in porn quality doesn't really matter, as long as your not asking your self the question "Is that a nipple or an anus?"

And to some of us, even that doesn't matter ;)

Re:Rambus will not die

[chip guy]

You spin an interesting story but much of it seems to be speculation and erroneous speculation at that. Tuesday I had a good long chat with the principal engineer in charge of chipsets at Intel. The 820/rambus problem is understood and related to mixing and matching RIMMs from different manufacturers in systems with all three sockets populated. I won't go into details but it is not an inherent and irrevocable problem with DRDRAM but rather a pretty usual teething problem. Same thing happened when PC66 SDRAM came out and again when PC100 came along. No one claimed that SDRAM was inherently unworkable did they? Rambus's technical problem in 820 boards will be sorted out.

The real issue is economic and whether rambus can provide a compelling reason for its adoption in PCs in the face of its much higher costs. I have my own opinion on that and it differs from the Intel guys. But Sun has voted for rambus with a DRDRAM controller in their 5200 MAJC chip. And Compaq has continued the pattern of the Alpha EV7 and announced that the eight issue EV8 would also have DRDRAM controllers built in. Many people and companies other than Intel have made expensive votes of confidence in rambus.

Re:Blame it on the quake?

[R. Anthony]

Imagine for a moment that a catastrophe destroyed *all* the memory production capacity except that from a single company. By your logic, that one company's prices shouldn't be affected by the disaster. Of course, that cannot be.

I think you misunderstand. The point of my last point was to establish that the earthqake was not the sole cause of the sharp spike in SDRAM prices. I think that point was made. I cited micron as an example because Micron DRAM was, is, and has been available in abundance, so it serves as a useful indicator.

There are obviously a lot more issues at work here, and a lot more foreign companies making DRAM besides the US and Taiwan. NEC is in Japan, and Samsung is in Korea for instance.

The reality of markets is, of course, far more complicated than your argument (and mine) would have it be. Even a credible prediction of a quake in Taiwan would affect prices in the markets in which Taiwan is a major player.

I wasn't my intention to do a full analysis of the market forces that led to the exponential rise in DRAM prices. I was meerly offering the results of a small case study. If you look further in this thread, the myriad reasons for the DRAM price increases are addressed.

Where you can get SDRAM cheap

[drix]

A lot of you might already know this, but if you've been cursed into having to buy SDRAM right now, probably the cheapest prices you'll find will be at the office supply stores. Okay, I'll wait for you to stop laughing... yes, Staples, OfficeMax, Office Depot, etc. all have pretty cheap SDRAM at the moment. Basically RAM isn't exactly a hot seller at these stores (you probably hadn't considered buying it there until just now) so their inventory is a couple months old. If you've been following RAM prices lately, you'll know that a couple months makes all the difference in the world in terms of price. Most stores, unless their inventory guys are really on the ball, will still be charging the price from three months ago for the RAM they got three months ago. Even if you don't need RAM, you can make a real killing on Ebay this way.

Re:Where you can get SDRAM cheap

[drix]

My OfficeMax isn't even within $50. Like I said, it depends on the diligency of the staff.

NEC, Samsung, and the Quake

[Taco Cowboy]

NEC and Samsung are having financial difficulties.

The Taiwanese quake has drastically reduced the output from the Taiwanese SDRAM's manufacturers, thus making the price of SDRAM much more expensive - and in turn, making SDRAM a much more profitable venture for financial troubling companies like NEC and Samsung to switch their manufacturing lines.

If the above is not enough, the marketplace has spoken. RAMBUS is too overly hyped - for the price difference of nearly 50% (and more) you get the performance hike of less than 10% (or less) - and who wants to spend more of their money for such lousy improvements?!