papa@pollux.usc.edu (Marco Papa) (01/01/70)
With the dollar plunging, all the quotes for RAM chips are way off. The 1 Meg chips (120 nsec.) that JDR Microdevices advertises at $19.95 are now over $31. I did some research while I was getting my ASDG 8M board, and one is lucky to get $25-$26 1 Meg chips. Most mail order RAM chip dealers will sell you the 120 ns - 1 Meg chips for about $30, while 100 ns. will go even more. Note that it is much easier to find 100ns than 120ns. So do not believe the ads. Computer Shopper and BYTE have a very long lead time, and with the monetary markets being so volatile, their RAM prices can't be up to date. -- Marco Papa Felsina Software
tomb@hplsla.HP.COM (Tom Bruhns) (12/10/87)
My (fairly good, high-powered) grapevine tells me that at least part of the problem in high prices for the 1Mbit ram chips is poor yields at the manufacturers lines. If it is indeed only the monitary (exchange-rate) problem that is causing the high prices, this is a GOLDEN opportunity for US manufacturers to make up some lost time/$ -- if they can respond in time -- and to regain a lot of lost market for the future as well. Has anyone done a comparison similar to the basenote's, but for the 256k chips? If they have gone up by the same amount, then it clearly IS exchange-rate driven; if not, I think it points to technical problems, as I have heard. Tom Bruhns uucp: !hplabs!hplsla!tomb