Well, I have said many times. you can never be too kool..
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What is on your workbench right now?
Explain please
Hipocrates
Active Member
Samsung, SK hynix, Micron halted consumer manufacturing to lock multiyear contracts with AI Hardware companies(Nvidia/AMD) and hyperscalers , driving prices +700% on DDR4/DDR5, SSD, Vram for GPUs that are basically low stock with huge markups, with silicon preserved for enterprise (hyperscalers), add to that motherboards manufacturers are suffering due market collapse and extremely high costs of components and PCBs, so they are increasing prices. At this point it does matter anymore.... PC Building as it is right now is prohibitive, 6k to 9K USD for a very good PC with a nice GPU. So this is the meme for us PC builders, gamers and/or high end workstations people.
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I assume many of you onboard on this thread are also aware of another discussion hosted by @TonyJZX entitled “is anyone affected by the rampocalypse? gpupocalypse? nandpocalypse?”; I simply participated by writing my post #23.
Hipocrates
Active Member
My apologies for the OT post. Back the usual program of this thread.
Thanks, I don't follow things that closely to realize what was happening. It doesn't look good for the cost of factory computers either.
Everyone wanted to blame price increases on tariffs.
Hipocrates
Active Member
Oh tariffs added some quota to the prices, but more than that, added massive levels of uncertainty, and if that is not enough, just wait and see what the war in Iran does to helium, bromine and other petrochemicals markets needed for chip manufacturing and to logistics. But now we're getting into global supplies and geopolitics and the mods will get me the boot for derailing this thread.
I had to disassemble and clean the contacts in the power switch on my Timemore Black Mirror coffee scales. The contacts were full of brown gunk (which wasn't coffee!). I turns out that a sliver cut from a disposable wooden coffee stirrer is exactly the right thickness to clean the tracks inside the switch 
This is what I'm working on at the moment. It's a three-valve RIAA stage (on the PCB) with DC heaters (on the tagboard) using pretty much a load of components I've had since the 1970s.
The fan is only there to suck away the soldering fumes.
The board has properly plated-through holes, so I'm placing the larger components under the board so the valve bases can be close to the chassis and the valves poke through.
It's intended to go with my valve amps (GEC 912+ and Quad II) in my study. I currently use the excellent phono stage in my AIWA C50 preamp, but want something more with the aesthetic of my valve amps. I have no illusions that it will be in any way comparable in performance, but as long as it's 'Good Enough' I'll be pleased.
Still thinking about how to house it. I have a 1U 19" rack mount box from an old NTP product I can repurpose, but not yet fully decided.
S
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