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I'm all for re-using old but still perfectly usable hardware. Hopefully this will also lead to some optimisations on the software side
by wrxd 9mo ago
I'm all for re-using old but still perfectly usable hardware. Hopefully this will also lead to some optimisations on the software side
- kasane_teto 9mo agoit probably wont
- nehal3m 9mo agoOpenAI buys all the RAM driving up the price so their models can shit out poorly optimized software so I have to buy more RAM. Awesome.
- embedding-shape 9mo agoSure, except this time also add on US pressuring Korean companies to not sell their old equipment to Chinese manufacturers, so the supply could actually keep up. But no no, it's all OpenAI's fault for behaving like the capitalistic swines they are. Both suck, but one has a long-lasting impact, the other is just what capitalists always done, and will continue in the future.
- georgefrowny 9mo agoAnd then when China eventually produce not only RAM but the equipment to make it, it'll be shocked Pikachu all round.
- lysace 9mo agoAgreed - it's more likely to lead to poor user experience than anything else. Most end-user facing software/service companies will probably bet on the DRAM price peak being temporary. Software takes a lot of time to build. Codebases live for decades. There's often an impossibly large cost in starting over with a less wasteful architecture/language/etc. Think going from an Electron/Chromium app to something built using some compiled language and native OS GUI constructs that uses 10x less resources.
- Workaccount2 9mo agoThe impossibly large cost is the difference between hardware and software returns. Hardware by nature forces redesigns whereas software it's always possible to just keep building on top of old bad designs, and so much cheaper and faster to do so. That's why hardware is 10,000x faster than 30 years ago, and even simple word processors are debatabely faster than 30 years ago. Maybe even slower.
- immibis 9mo agoHardware isn't much better actually. There isn't a good way I can show you this, but every x64 CPU contains an entire ARM CPU whose job is to initialize the x64 CPU. And of course it runs two operating systems - TrustZone and Minix.
- Krutonium 9mo agoIt's even worse than that. The ARM Core starts up, does crypto, Loads the SecureOS and the BIOS, then it starts the x86 CPU - In 16 bit mode! Which then boostraps itself through 32 then 64 bit mode. So in the first couple sends of power on, your CPU is at various points ARM, i386, x86, and x86_64.
- lysace 9mo agoHow much overhead (in terms of e.g. transistor count or silicon space) does this add? Surely at most it's a single digit percentage?
- immibis 9mo agoThere isn't a separate 8086 core in every x64 core. The whole core has "if/then" spaghetti logic scattered throughout to alter its behaviour based on being in 16-bit mode. At best, they might have been able to confine the needed logic patches to the instruction-decoding front end.
- palmotea 9mo ago
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 9mo agoSo much software optimization, like rolling out new codecs that aren't accelerated on old but usable hardware.
- Hamuko 9mo agoHas anyone noticed their employer actually cutting back on employee hardware purchases? Because if new laptops are still being handed over to developers on a 2–4 year cycle, then probably not. Game developers might have to do something though if high-end GPUs are going to end up being $5000.
- wincy 9mo agoAt least so far the RTX 5090 seems to be available and at the same price it’s been at for the past six months (around $3000). I’m not sure when you’d see GPUs affected by the RAM price increases.
- Hamuko 9mo agoThere's been rumblings. https://www.techpowerup.com/344578/leaks-predict-usd-5000-rtx-5090-gpus-in-2026-thanks-to-ai-industry-demand https://www.techpowerup.com/344578/leaks-predict-usd-5000-rt...
- isk517 9mo agoI'm pretty sure GPUs have their own RAM installed that is usually higher spec than the motherboard RAM.
- mananaysiempre 9mo agoHigher in some respects (bandwidth), lower in others (latency, even though ordinary DDR5 is already no speed demon there and LPDDR5 is worse). At least from the spec sheet, these kinds of RAM are so different that I don’t really understand how demand for one can cause a shortage of the other, unless they are competing for the same manufacturing lines.
- tverbeure 9mo agoFWIW: GDDR is not higher latency than DDR. It just seems that way because the GDDR interface clock is much higher, so the number of clocks are higher too. But in terms of wall clock time, the latency is very similar. Which makes sense: the latency is determined by the underlying storage technology and the way to access that storage, which the same for both.
- UltraSane 9mo agoSore, every single app will be a separate instance of Chrome.