Intel Reiterates Chip Supply Shortages Could Last Several Years (reuters.com) 91
Intel Corp's CEO said on Monday it could take several years for a global shortage of semiconductors to be resolved, a problem that has shuttered some auto production lines and is also being felt in other areas, including consumer electronics. From a report: Pat Gelsinger told a virtual session of the Computex trade show in Taipei that the work-and-study-from-home trend during the COVID-19 pandemic had led to a "cycle of explosive growth in semiconductors" that has placed huge strain on global supply chains. "But while the industry has taken steps to address near term constraints it could still take a couple of years for the ecosystem to address shortages of foundry capacity, substrates and components." Gelsinger had told The Washington Post in an interview in mid-April the shortage was going to take âoea couple of yearsâ to abate, and that it planned to start producing chips within six to nine months to address shortages at U.S. car plants.
sounds like a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:sounds like a threat (Score:5, Interesting)
This article https://www.wired.com/story/software-entrepreneur-pandemic-pivot-manufacturing-masks/ [wired.com] gives some insight into what it's like to run a factory in the US when all of the equipment support industry is focused on and based in China. And that's for a product (masks) you can sell locally. There's very little industry here (compared to the global market) that directly consumes hi-end semiconductors; even the modules that are used in local manufacture are assembled in other countries.
Re:sounds like a threat (Score:4, Interesting)
That's an interesting article. Keep in mind that machines made for China aren't designed to be as robust or easy to fix as we would expect, because labor in China is so cheap. They have a different set of priorities than we do: make the machine cheap, even if it requires more manual labor to make it work, because workers are cheap.
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Keep in mind that machines made for China aren't designed to be as robust or easy to fix as we would expect, because labor in China is so cheap.
Totally. The inexorable follow-on point from that is: if we don't already manufacture such machines locally, to match our own labor conditions, someone who wants to set up a factory here has no choice but to either develop something completely from scratch, or go through the same lessons learned as that mask company in the article I posted: take the Chinese-market machines and deal with adapting them. This is all just the end game from decades of industries moving out of high-cost countries; the industries
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Because we allow it. The Chinese gov't keeps wages and their currency artificially low to keep their export-oriented economic engine going as-is. Their migrant work-force are de-facto slave laborers who are restricted per living location.
We should tariff bigger countries with crappy labor and human rights practices.
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Let's talk about tech reuse (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Let's talk about tech reuse (Score:4, Informative)
That's what I did. Bought a refurb Lenovo micro desktop on eBay to use for my home "work PC". It was less than $250, included an OEM Win10 Pro license, and is still more hardware than I need considering I just use it to connect to a VPN and remote into my PC at work.
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We passed the "need" vs "want" level of performance on PC a decade ago. I would say that 90% of everything that a normal user would want to do can be done with a 10 year old PC. That includes a reasonable level of gaming. I have yet to see any office work that can't be done with a older PC.
A reasonable exception could be made for GPU's but probably not much of one. I'm still rocking with a GTX 1080. It's still reasonably powerful for the games I play.
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Mr Reasonable meet Mr "whaaa miners denying me my GPU/CPU". Clearly the squeaky wheels* don't agree with this thread.
*A sizable squeaky wheel if Nvidia is diverting the resources to make them quiet.
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I guess it depends on your budget and whether your employer is paying for it.
I ended up buying a used Core i5 laptop because there is nothing on the market here under $AU500 worth upgrading to - crappy RAM-crippled Celerons & Chromebooks. I mean 4-8GB max in 2021; garbage...
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It's not a money thing. From my own experience and talking to colleagues, many big-company IT departments are quoting _months_ of leadtime to get a replacement computer or a computer for a new hire, especially laptops. They include links to the press releases from the manufacturers to show it's not IT's fault. And these are just plebeian Office 365 machines, nothing special or high end. Have you tried to buy a hard drive recently? A GPU? Oof.
RAM requirements, I guess it depends what you are doing. For Offic
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Well likewise, I had a spare stick lying around and doubled my 'new' machine's RAM.
(As for usage it's currently using 12.8GB out of 16 - that's Windows 10 for ya!)
But my point is I wouldn't buy a brand new machine that limited itself to less just because they want to upsell you to a higher-priced model - global scarcity of components or not.
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Tech re-use?
Lots of car factories are waiting for these chips to build new cars and they can't do that right now, worker a fiddling their thumbs, they can't go dumpster-diving to build cars.
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Car computers have way more inside than just eproms. Voltage regulators, processors, logic devices, mosfets, you name it. Semiconductors of all types are having year long lead times and even passive components like capacitors and connectors are difficult to find. It's a ripple effect through the whole supply chain, everything from 50 cent opamps to $100 Lemo connectors.
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Re:Let's talk about tech reuse (Score:5, Informative)
. . . and when my daughters needed new desktops, I bought 2 off-the-shelf Raspberry Pi 3Bs. All the functionality they needed: just plug in to existing peripherals and our wired network. . . For most uses, a current-gen PC is way overkill. . .
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That's one trick. The other is basically modern-day time sharing. Since most are geeks here it should be as easy as PI.
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Their own fabs (Score:2)
But don't Intel make their own chips, why would they be affected by the world market if they dont lease out capacity or buys external capacity?
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the automotive industry (Score:2, Insightful)
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Planned obsolescence is so much easier to realize in software/computers than analog systems though.
In analog systems, a knowledgeable person could buy a better aftermarket relays (at a lower cost than OEM probably) and be done with it.
If you put everything behind the black box, the peasants are forever in your clutches.
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Software and licensing, don't forget that.
Customers and third party repair shops have endless rights to repair, analyse, improve, use, resell non-software-based technology.
For software-based technology, licensing allows basically every dirty trick in the book to stop customers and third parties from doing anything. Add a cryptographic signature and send in the Feds when a customer tinkers with their own purchase.
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You should give this a read https://www.computerworld.com/... [computerworld.com]
car rent only = hail storm bill of $2000+ (Score:2)
car rent only = hail storm bill of $2000+ and all they need to say is that car was in the area of the storm
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The ultimate goal is to make the population completely dependent on government for every single aspect of their lives, as this is the only way to ensure they'll be compliant, and one of the quickest ways is to start by controlling the movement of people.
Even bible-pushers know the easiest way to ensure compliance is to control how people buy and sell things, especially food. Watch for things like what we're experiencing here down under - government welfare cards that only allow spending on certain types of products, in the misguided attempt to stop expenditure on alcohol and tobacco.
https://www.dss.gov.au/families-and-children/programmes-services/welfare-conditionality/cashless-debit-card-overview
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That would be nice, but companies make a lot of cash by having stuff that cannot be repaired, nor replaced. A large part of the IoT industry is based on, "well, we can't update Device 1.0, so you either live with its security holes and expect it to be pwned, or you can buy our Device 2.0 which might just fix some." Similar with cars. Newer cars have 10-100+ different modules on the CAN, and it does a good job at ensuring the car goes back to a dealer for $$$, or to the scrapyard and a new one is purchase
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Re:the automotive industry (Score:4, Insightful)
Going back to analog circuits would make cares more expensive and less reliable. Are people on Slashdot seriously pining for the crappy automotive systems of the 1980's?
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I think they're actually pining for the days of totally analog automotive systems. Rotary distributors with points and just a handful of electronic items switched with analog switches, the kind of car that can survive an EMP.
The 1980s were kind of the worst, electronic systems that were not so reliable combined with a bunch of lingering analog stuff.
I think that the digital signaling and computerization isn't that bad. You get way better diagnostics and faults are easier to sort out. A lot of wiring harn
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Rotary distributors with points and just a handful of electronic items switched with analog switches, the kind of car that can survive an EMP.
No, no it cannot. An EMP will fry your coil. Space weather burns out grid wiring semi-regularly! If you want a vehicle which can survive an EMP without consequences you're talking mechanical diesel with an air starter, which in turn means a medium diesel like a Cummins 6C because light diesels weren't so equipped.
The 1980s were kind of the worst, electronic systems that were not so reliable combined with a bunch of lingering analog stuff.
Totally fucking wrong. The 80s to 90s were the best, you had minimal electronic systems which were dramatically more reliable than points ignitions and offered sequential fuel injection, at least i
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The problem with computerization isn't really the computer technology, it's the tight-lipped manufacturer that doesn't provide decoding for their system fault codes.
The OTHER problem with computerization, ESPECIALLY connected computerization, is that it both enables and encourages too many user-hostile behaviors on the part of the manufacturer. And this is not just cars. "Pay extra to unlock feature". "Feature will be disabled if appliance can't checkin to mothership to verify subscription status" "Feature is partially implemented in the cloud, so when we go away or we get bored with running those old servers, your hardware stops working." "We have the right to collect
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They seriously do. People here can't stand Tesla and moan constantly about their new fangled cars that they can't work on. Your brand new car is just as mechanical as your 1980s smog detuned shitbox. Other than some devices that need dealer programmed when replaced nothing has changed.
You'd think a site geared towards nerds and tech minded people would have a high opinion of an electric car that runs Linux for its subsystems. But nope everyone here is like fuck that electric bullshit car for millionaires. M
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Meanwhile a new Ford truck with a few options is about the same price as a Tesla.
A new F150 Lightning is gonna be way the hell less than a Cybertruck and yet be way the hell more useful due to its normal truck shape. EVs are the total business and I am stoked AF that they are taking over. I hope I can rub together the scratch to buy the new electric Ford, and it might even be possible between a trade-in on my current F150 and the tax credit.
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No. We are pining for the systems of the 1960's. I'm calling bullshit on your idea that analog is less reliable because I was around back then. Its far, far more resilient than anything since. And you can fix them without needing a stocked up parts store. In the 1980's the idea of auto control systems was still in beta, so of course if you had a brain you didn't buy one of them.
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should go back to more analog systems
Digital is more reliable than analog. That's a stupid idea.
there is no need for thousands of dollars worth of electronic computer control in a passenger car & pickup truck,
You can still buy basic vehicles if you want. Most people don't want.
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You can still buy basic vehicles if you want. Most people don't want.
Though in fact... you can't in any real sense, because neverending regulatory expansion, "minimum to compete" feature sets and various manufacturer priorities like "harvest data from the driver and monetize it", keep expanding the definition of "basic".
With the regulatory mandate for backup cameras, you now cannot purchase a car without a color LCD and a 32 or 64-bit microcontroller-driven headend. (Yes there are other ways to achieve the same goal, but the cheapest way is digitally, because you can use the
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You can still buy basic vehicles if you want. Most people don't want.
I call bullshit. No. I call twisted Bullshit. Most people would be fine with a vehicle with less electronics running them. But the companies won't sell them. It's bad for business because they make more from repairs than from sales. And if anyone can fix them, the dealerships can't get cars in on which to do $200/hour service charges (because a local mechanic will charge less than half that). Make everything in the fucking car need a computer chip to operate, and monopolize the ability to fix those systems,
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Most people would be fine with a vehicle with less electronics running them.
What does that mean? "Running them" implies actually running the engine, to those of us who understand cars. Is that what you meant? Or were you talking about the infotainment system?
But the companies won't sell them.
If you mean vehicles with simple engine control units, they aren't viable. If you mean vehicles with simple infotainment systems, they do still exist. But people generally tend to buy vehicles with more stuff in them, so automakers focus on selling those. Just like how most people don't buy sticks, so most cars aren't offered w
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"If you mean vehicles with simple engine control units, they aren't viable"
Huh. Funny, all my vehicles with simple ECUs are two+ decades old and still operational. What isn't viable, again? Oh, wait, you think there's a difference between analog and digital. Nevermind.
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They can't meet modern emissions standards and/or mileage targets, except vehicles which wouldn't meet modern crash safety standards. And those I am fully behind, despite what they've done to styling.
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People have voted with their wallet,
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I have 50+ yrs of experience that calls bullshit on that. I *work* in the trade, I should know. Most people are not given a meaningful choice (favorite trick of the elites) and no, analog or purely mechanical systems are far more reliable -- less to break down in the first place, is the less that *will* break down. Not saying anything about "planned obsolescence" (another favorite trick of the elites). It's almost like they want you to think the "company store" is better than the Government, when in reality
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and no, analog or purely mechanical systems are far more reliable
On average, they are not. Only a few of the purely mechanical systems were highly reliable. Most of them were breaking down frequently, and requiring fiddling all the time to run properly in the first place. The electronic systems are self-tuning and self-diagnosing.
You're not the only mechanic around these parts.
A few of the old mechanical systems were reliable, like some of the diesels. None of the fully mechanical gassers were reliable at all, though. And most of the fully mechanical diesels weren't eith
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"Digital is more reliable than analog. That's a stupid idea."
Digital is nothing more than discrete quantized analog. Saying one is more reliable than the other is simply bullshit, especially when one is based directly off of the other.
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With digital it is all or nothing, it works until it doesn't. This is how you get stranded on the side of the road.
A great example is analog vs digital TV.
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They could do away with computers altogether on the fuel injection if they wanted to. Mechanical-only fuel injection was a thing back in the day. Invented during WW2 and popularized in the 1960's. The difference between fully-mechanical and modern EFI (in terms of efficiency and fuel economy) was only on the order of 15%. And as for ifinition, the old GM HEI system had only 7 transistors, all located in the distributor housing. Which tended to cost less than $10 for a new module, and lasted for decades all
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Throw away your threadripper servers and replace them 286s while you're at it.
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That's crazy.
- Digital electronics are far more reliable than analog electronics.
- Digital electronics are far more capable than analog electronics. The difference between a 1970s analog injection system and a current digital one is night and day: your car runs more efficiently, is cleaner, and if something does go wrong, it'll tell you in detail where the error is.
- digital electronics save weight: you can replace bundles of analog wiring with a single Canbus wire.
- digital electronics offer features that
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" Digital electronics are far more reliable than analog electronics."
Yea, you tell that to all of my dead-ass 1990s era solid state amplifiers, meanwhile my old 1978 Fender Super Reverb still fucking works, on the original Fender tube set.
Except for the chips... (Score:5, Funny)
Re: Except for the chips... (Score:5, Funny)
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There are millions of pizza shop basements full of them.
Intel Reiterates ... (Score:1)
Intel Reiterates Chip Supply Shortages Could Last Several Very Profitable Price Gouging Years
TFTFY
Time Seems Right... (Score:1)
... for the heavy-hitters like auto companies to start building their own chips rather than relying on Chinese factories to supply them all. They need to build them in the US, too.
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Should have been investing in production plants (Score:2)
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where's the invisible hand? (Score:2)
I thought the free market was supposed to take care of this by raising prices to entice new producers, but I can still get a new laptop for $400.
Sounds like a promise (Score:2)
Intel is stepping aside so that Apple Silicon can take over.
Greedy corporations and executives (Score:5, Insightful)
Intel has spent billions on stock buybacks, not improving their supply chain or ability to ramp up production.
Not only has this provided big cash infusions to equity compensated executives and driven up stock prices to quiet critics, it lets them tell the market to suck it and pay demand-driven price increases because their production doesn't keep up with demand.
I'm sure they'll also manage to get hand-outs for plants that will never come on line, too, with build outs mysteriously cancelled as supply and demand align again.
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I'm sure they'll also manage to get hand-outs for plants that will never come on line, too, with build outs mysteriously cancelled as supply and demand align again.
Damn, I wish I had mod points for this. It's sub-MOA-accurate at 10,000 yards. Thinking back over all the "factory stimulus money" handouts in the US, how many of them result in the construction of an operational facility that even remotely resembles its initial promises? Even assuming the best intentions and genuine motivations of all parties involved (which - LOL), the time it takes to build and bring up such a facility is _WAY_ longer than the market movements (by "market" I'm referring to customer needs
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I mean some of Intel's problems may be technical difficulties in process shrink or whatever that hurt their ultimately ability to scale up production.
But it's the money spent on stock buybacks that makes this seem ultimately just greed as the first motivation. My low effort googling only focused on $10 billion spent in some second half of 2020, it's probably more than that.
But somehow there seems to be a public duty here. If they're going to get patents and other intellectual property protection that has
Intel Reiterates Price Gouging will Continue (Score:1)
Intel: "Given that the restoration of our supply channels is almost complete, we didn't want anyone to get the idea we would return to pre-pandemic pricing. Our underlying costs of material and labor have gone down, compared to two years ago, but we want our customer base to realize - we're not giving up our insanely high margin without a fight. Competition has never been lower, and our product hasn't seen this level of demand since we first launched our way-cool "Intel Inside" commercials, and everyone th
Finally happy maybe (Score:2)
When I was at Intel, the elders endlessly waxed nostalgic about how much money they made back in the summer of 2000.
They were all waiting around to have it happen one more time, while chasing one bad idea after another.
Shares hit $75 back then but plummeted to $27 six months later. It's taken twenty years to crawl back to $60.
Maybe now those inept bunglers will cash out and retire.
I Want My... (Score:2)
God damn! This is going to delay the flying cars again.