Samsung is reportedly preparing to wind down its SATA SSD business, and a notable hardware leaker warns the move could have broader implications for consumer storage pricing than Micron’s decision to end its Crucial RAM lineup. The report suggests reduced supply and short-term price pressure may follow as the market adjusts.
  • Kazumara@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    15·
    10 hours ago

    I take issue with this forced distinction they are making

    Micron, like Samsung and SK Hynix, already supplies memory chips directly to third-party brands such as G.Skill and ADATA. Even without Crucial-branded kits, Micron DRAM continues to reach consumers through other manufacturers, meaning overall supply remains largely unchanged.

    Nobody ever officially suggested the Crucial supply was likely to shift to the other manufacturers for consumers. On the contrary people expect this to be a step towards a general redistribution of manufacturing capacity towards HBM for parallel compute products.

    By comparison, Samsung exiting SATA SSDs removes an entire class of finished consumer products from one of the world’s largest NAND suppliers. Tom argues that this is why the Samsung move is “worse” for consumers: it directly affects how many drives are available, not just who sells them.

    If you wanted you could make the same argument as for Micron. Who says the Samsung NAND couldn’t be bought by other OEMs to make consumer SSDs. It’s just as possible as the Micron supply shifting to other OEMs who make consumer RAM sticks.

    To me neither are likely. The manufacturing capacity both companies are pulling from the consumer market in both cases is going to go to the higher profit margin parallel compute server market. Neither is worse than the other, they are both equally bad news for us consumers.

    • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.worldEnglish
      6·
      8 hours ago

      On the contrary people expect this to be a step towards a general redistribution of manufacturing capacity towards HBM for parallel compute products.

      That is where much of the overall wafers are going. But that would be happening regardless of whether the Crucial brand is around or not. Even if Crucial was still a thing going forward, those same wafers would still be going towards HBM.

      I think he hit the nail on the head when he said that Crucial being cancelled is just a symptom of our shit market, not one of the causes.

      Who says the Samsung NAND couldn’t be bought by other OEMs to make consumer SSDs

      His point is that Samsung (the manufacturer) is scrapping production, not that Samsung (the consumer brand) is stopping selling products that otherwise are still being produced and sold under different brand names.

      Stopping production of something sold under many brands is obviously a lot worse than a brand stopping sales of something that other brands will still sell (albeit in lower quantities in previous years due to HBM production being ramped up at the cost of DDR5).