Potential HDD shortage Q3 2011 (midsummer)

[Student26]

Our storage needs aren't shrinking by any means. Games are getting bigger, our music and movies collection keeps growing, we have media players, NAS boxes, and, well, you get the idea. Despite solid state drives taking over as the sexy boot option, we suspect the market for beefy and affordable hard drives will stick around for a long time yet. That said, if you're in need of more storage, you might be better served by pulling the trigger now rather than waiting until the last minute.

According to news and rumor site DigiTimes, there's a good chance there will be a global shortage of hard drives in the second half of 2011. After the devastating earthquake in Japan earlier this year, both Texas Instruments and Renasas Electronics, two major suppliers of HDD chips, have their Japan factories back up and running at full steam. The reason for the predicted shortage, however, is that they'll need to have their products recertified,and that will serve as a bottleneck in the production process. On top of it all, DigiTimes says hard drive demand typically peaks in the third quarter.

Well guess if youre looking for an HDD then now would be a good time and hopefully there will be no long term ramifications.

Sourcehttp://www.maximumpc.com/article/new...drive_shortage

[JayCub]

Interesting information i wonder how much storage they recommend, and how much is enough these days... as for myself im terrible and have lots of storage.
Thank you Student food for thought

[Bearcat]

Thanks for the news Student. It will interesting to see how much prices go up, especially over here, where people have already had to tighten their belts on spending, because of the economy.

[JayCub]

Tricky one that Bear on the other hand alot of economies are struggling and pushing the prices up may cost them more with loss of sales, i would imagine it is a hard balancing act, still i wouldn't panic buy i just hope the standards remain good and they don't cut corners although this is another way to go out of buisness, either way there will be some knock on effect... but i have seen quite a few drops in SATA III 6.0 Gbps lets hope the trend heads that way...

[Bearcat]

The US economy is one of them that is struggling big time right now Jay and since it is a huge consumer market for technology, I have to believe it will take its toll on HDD sales also.