10 ms·

That's the beauty of the "There are a variety of reasons" part, whatever you believe to be the reason, Valve seems to agree with you, biases or not.

Gigachad 4mo ago
The variety of reasons being Mark Zuckerberg, Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, etc. We all know why hardware has become unaffordable even if Valve hasn't spelled it out.
- embedding-shape 4mo ago
  That's the thing, you care about celebrities, others about reality. If US didn't stop Korean companies from selling old manufacturing equipment to China, we'd still have RAM available, but Chinese one, so obviously every capitalist would rather blame individuals instead of the US government. But thats my perspective, which obviously I feel like is closer to the truth on the ground, wouldn't claim it's some universal truth though.
  - sofixa 4mo ago
    We do still have Chinese manufactured RAM available, it's just that it's DDR4 which is not compatible with a lot of the hardware made in the past years.
    - tremon 4mo ago
      ...which is also why both Intel and AMD are reviving some of their previous DDR4-based models: the current DDR5 offerings are increasingly unsellable because of the memory shortage.
  - Dylan16807 4mo ago
    China seems to be ramping up memory production anyway? I can accept that as a contributing cause but the main cause is the small number of companies that are buying all the ram. Even if there was more supply they'd still be screwing up the prices.
    - embedding-shape 4mo ago
      "High demand" is not a concrete issue and blaming the purchasers seems so misdirected I'm almost convinced that argument originated from sockpuppets or something. If the fries factory runs out of fries, would we blame consumers for buying too much, or the factory for not catching up with demand? Why sell stuff if it's not meant to be bought?
      - Dylan16807 4mo ago
        If an industrial plant figures out a new way to turn fries into fuel and starts buying all the fries in the country at any price up to $50 a pound, I do blame them for the resulting price spike. This is not consumer demand. I don't much blame the factory that's already running 24/7 for failing to catch up in the short term. I'm not going to insist they do the impossible, or that they should have forseen a demand spike that caught us all by surprise.
        deleted 4mo ago
        [deleted]
      - dv_dt 4mo ago
        The large ai companies bought advance purchases of memory while the actual buildouts are massively lagging and will probably never materialize at even 70% of planned capacity for years. They are financed and motivated to create their own tulip craze disconnected with actual need
      - mastermage 4mo ago
        See the problem is they bought fries, that haven't been produced yet, with money that doesn't exist. For end users that do not want fries.
      - intended 4mo ago
        What the heck? High demand and a long lead time product - you can’t spin up fabs overnight to adapt to demand. This creates a period where the people with the largest amount of capital can out compete other buyers in the market. This is the situation at play right now. Your model is too simple.
noosphr 4mo ago
Valve open silicon when? I believe in you Gabe.
- jrepinc 4mo ago
  Yeah hat would be awesome. Some RISC-V processor or something like that. A man can dream :)
- amatecha 4mo ago
  The MNT Station, currently in development, could very well be a fully-OSHW "Steam Machine": https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt-research/mnt-station https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt-research/mnt-station
  - vaylian 4mo ago
    What about the graphics processing capability? I see there are some modules with a GPU on them. Are they good enough to run 3D games that were released in the last 5 years? I'm also happy with older games. I just don't know how powerful these GPUs are.
    - amatecha 4mo ago
      Depends which CPU module you get, but yeah it's not nearly as powerful as the new Steam Machine, surely. I mean, it's a step in the right direction and you can see people are playing many recent-ish (or lower-GPU-intensity) games, as discussed in this thread: https://community.mnt.re/t/mnt-reform-gaming-thread/608/110 https://community.mnt.re/t/mnt-reform-gaming-thread/608/110
- Kirby64 4mo ago
  Doesn't solve any problems that are causing the price crunches. The problem is largely RAM and NAND pricing, which no small shop is going to spin up a fab to create. Making your own SoC would do little to alleviate the price issues.

Gigachad 4mo ago

The variety of reasons being Mark Zuckerberg, Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, etc. We all know why hardware has become unaffordable even if Valve hasn't spelled it out.

embedding-shape 4mo ago
That's the thing, you care about celebrities, others about reality. If US didn't stop Korean companies from selling old manufacturing equipment to China, we'd still have RAM available, but Chinese one, so obviously every capitalist would rather blame individuals instead of the US government. But thats my perspective, which obviously I feel like is closer to the truth on the ground, wouldn't claim it's some universal truth though.
- sofixa 4mo ago
  We do still have Chinese manufactured RAM available, it's just that it's DDR4 which is not compatible with a lot of the hardware made in the past years.
  - tremon 4mo ago
    ...which is also why both Intel and AMD are reviving some of their previous DDR4-based models: the current DDR5 offerings are increasingly unsellable because of the memory shortage.
- Dylan16807 4mo ago
  China seems to be ramping up memory production anyway? I can accept that as a contributing cause but the main cause is the small number of companies that are buying all the ram. Even if there was more supply they'd still be screwing up the prices.
  - embedding-shape 4mo ago
    "High demand" is not a concrete issue and blaming the purchasers seems so misdirected I'm almost convinced that argument originated from sockpuppets or something. If the fries factory runs out of fries, would we blame consumers for buying too much, or the factory for not catching up with demand? Why sell stuff if it's not meant to be bought?
    - Dylan16807 4mo ago
      If an industrial plant figures out a new way to turn fries into fuel and starts buying all the fries in the country at any price up to $50 a pound, I do blame them for the resulting price spike. This is not consumer demand. I don't much blame the factory that's already running 24/7 for failing to catch up in the short term. I'm not going to insist they do the impossible, or that they should have forseen a demand spike that caught us all by surprise.
      - deleted 4mo ago
        [deleted]
    - dv_dt 4mo ago
      The large ai companies bought advance purchases of memory while the actual buildouts are massively lagging and will probably never materialize at even 70% of planned capacity for years. They are financed and motivated to create their own tulip craze disconnected with actual need
    - mastermage 4mo ago
      See the problem is they bought fries, that haven't been produced yet, with money that doesn't exist. For end users that do not want fries.
    - intended 4mo ago
      What the heck? High demand and a long lead time product - you can’t spin up fabs overnight to adapt to demand. This creates a period where the people with the largest amount of capital can out compete other buyers in the market. This is the situation at play right now. Your model is too simple.

noosphr 4mo ago

Valve open silicon when? I believe in you Gabe.

jrepinc 4mo ago
Yeah hat would be awesome. Some RISC-V processor or something like that. A man can dream :)
amatecha 4mo ago
The MNT Station, currently in development, could very well be a fully-OSHW "Steam Machine": https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt-research/mnt-station https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt-research/mnt-station
- vaylian 4mo ago
  What about the graphics processing capability? I see there are some modules with a GPU on them. Are they good enough to run 3D games that were released in the last 5 years? I'm also happy with older games. I just don't know how powerful these GPUs are.
  - amatecha 4mo ago
    Depends which CPU module you get, but yeah it's not nearly as powerful as the new Steam Machine, surely. I mean, it's a step in the right direction and you can see people are playing many recent-ish (or lower-GPU-intensity) games, as discussed in this thread: https://community.mnt.re/t/mnt-reform-gaming-thread/608/110 https://community.mnt.re/t/mnt-reform-gaming-thread/608/110
Kirby64 4mo ago
Doesn't solve any problems that are causing the price crunches. The problem is largely RAM and NAND pricing, which no small shop is going to spin up a fab to create. Making your own SoC would do little to alleviate the price issues.