HDD Prices to SkyRocket

[WiiDSmoker]

I went ahead and shelled out 109 for a 2 TB...it's about to get ugly.

A large shortage of hard drives is expected in the coming months due to the worst flood to hit Thailand in over fifty years. As you can see in these images, Western Digital has been hit hard by the flooding and the company has suspended production in Thailand. Obviously, it’s going to take some time for Western Digital to recover from the flood damage to its factories. Other hard drive manufacturers (such as Seagate) will also be affected as component suppliers have experienced flooding. According to Western Digital CEO John Coyne, it will all add up to a significantly reduced supply of hard drives into 2012.

CRN reports that prices on hard drives are already rising in distribution channels and companies in the industry are watching inventory closely; some distributors may be stockpiling drives rather than selling them until the situation on the ground becomes clearer. Just how the shortage will ultimately affect consumers is also up in the air and will depend on how Western Digital and its distributors allocate existing inventory. PC makers are taking notice, however: Apple CEO Tim Cook is on the record as expecting “an overall industry shortage of disk drives” and a Dell spokesperson said the company is “working with our hard drive suppliers to address potential impact for the remainder of the year.”

 

[KnightWRX]

No, it's already gotten ugly. 3 weeks ago, 2 TB HDs were 90$ but could be had for as low as 70-80$ on sale.

Today they are in the 130$ range. You bought at the augmented prices

 

[MacHamster68]

that is the downside of manufacturers producing nearly all their products in one region , so if anything happens like floods or earthquakes the production stops , if they would spread out the production of their products around the globe evenly the impact of something like that would be minimal, as they would only need to increase production in other factories around the globe a bit to compensate

 

[AppleScruff1]

Time to go ssd.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

that is the downside of manufacturers producing nearly all their products in one region , so if anything happens like floods or earthquakes the production stops , if they would spread out the production of their products around the globe evenly the impact of something like that would be minimal, as they would only need to increase production in other factories around the globe a bit to compensate

Even if it was only WD that lost a factor and no one else was effected there still would be a shortage as my understanding is that it was one of WD major factories so that loss is going to be felt. I expect Segates will be able to source there required parts from elsewhere in the long term but the lost of WD factory is going to cause some long term delays as you can not just up your productions elsewhere to make up for that loss.

Time to go ssd.

Not going to do much good. Those are going to go up as well and a shortage of those as well.

 

[Heilage]

Prices have doubled in Norway by now, almost.

Not the time to need new hard drives.

 

[ZipZapRap]

I see 2TB Caviar Green drives around $90 average here in Australia.. so far, about a $10-20 increase.

 

[AppleScruff1]

Even if it was only WD that lost a factor and no one else was effected there still would be a shortage as my understanding is that it was one of WD major factories so that loss is going to be felt. I expect Segates will be able to source there required parts from elsewhere in the long term but the lost of WD factory is going to cause some long term delays as you can not just up your productions elsewhere to make up for that loss.



Not going to do much good. Those are going to go up as well and a shortage of those as well.

Are the ssd's made at the same factory?