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by goku12 173 days ago
What I understood is that the author is hoarding them for the future - not because there is any need for it right now. You could argue that it's too much RAM even at end of server's useful lifetime. But who knows? What if he end up running a few dozen services on it at that time?

Honestly, the problem that they're preparing for, isn't any of our fault. This is inflicted upon the world by some very twisted business models, incentives and priorities. It's hard to predict how it will all end up. Perhaps the market will be flooded with tons of RAM that will have to be transplanted onto proper DIMM modules. Or perhaps we might be scavenging the e-waste junkyard for every last RAM IC we can find - in which case, his choice would be correct.
1 comments
reactordev 172 days ago
When we were space constrained, we built smaller. When we were block constrained, we build ssd’s. When we were graphics constrained, we built gpu’s. Now that we’re memory constrained, we’ll see some advancements in this area as well. 1TB ram chips are right around the corner.
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goku12 172 days ago
The problem is the economic incentive. In all the prior cases you mentioned, their commercial interests aligned with our own - at least in part. This time however, I'm worried that they aren't concerned about burning down the world economy, at least in part, since their bottom line won't suffer for it.

For example, Micron didn't think about any alternatives for the consumer retail market. They just dumped it entirely.

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reactordev 172 days ago
If Ford stopped making cars…

You fail to grasp that if Micron decides the consumer market isn’t for them, others will gladly fill that void.

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goku12 172 days ago
The economics behind this isn't rocket science. Micron left the retail market because it is more profitable for them to supply exclusively to the hyperscalers. Not because they can't supply the retail market or because it wasn't profitable. What makes you think that any other manufacturer is going to take a different decision? Why would they choose a market that offers less than the biggest bidder?
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reactordev 172 days ago
Someone will fill the void. Another company will sell ram to the retail market if the big players won't. More manufacturing abilities will open up. It's not like ram is becoming extinct. Someone will tool up and produce them for the retail market just as other brands have done in other sectors when the market shows a void.

Last I checked I could still buy Crucial RAM chips. In time, maybe it's Kingston. Or maybe Gigastone.

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