I hate to say I told you so...But here it is

First of all to Andy Enderby, the answer is I don't :-)

Back to the main thread,

Laptop logic reports that "Apple products in Manufacturer Bottleneck"

I quote "Component shortages are limiting sales of iMac and MacBook Pro models, and Apple's new Bluetooth wireless keyboard is also feeling the heat. Although the cause of the Bluetooth keyboard delay isn't known, if you configured your Mac with one you'll see almost a month delay for the entire order.

"

http://www.laptoplogic.com/news/detail.php?id=3156&rfp=dta

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Wednesday, Sep 26, 2007

Taipei Times also reports "Acer Inc president says component shortage a threat" they went on to say "The global credit squeeze is unlikely to affect sales of personal computers, according to Gianfranco Lanci, president of Taiwan-based PC group Acer, who says a shortage of components is the biggest challenge facing the industry today.

"

Tapei Times also quotes "Domestic rival Asustek Computer Inc (華碩電腦) confirmed last month a shortage of batteries, liquid-crystal-display panels, printed circuit boards and memory chips from the third quarter, especially for notebook computers."

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2007/09/26/2003380535

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MacWorld.com reports in a story by Dan Nystedt, IDG News Service "Notebook computer industry faces parts shortages

"

More specifically that

"All companies are facing a shortage of LCD (liquid crystal display) panels, the screen part of a laptop, while only smaller notebook computer makers are having trouble with shortages of batteries and HDDs, King wrote. The LCD supply for laptop makers has suffered this year due to brisk sales of LCD TVs, while the supply of small hard disk drives (HDDs) has dried up because they’re used in both notebooks and digital music players such as iPods.

"

http://www.macworld.com/news/2007/08/01/shortage/index.php

Weather the storm

Dell are doing a wonderful job and it is unfortunate that they are plagued by component shortages from the Far east, which are totally outside their control.

I'm sure they are not deliberately witholding orders nor sitting on them!

Just think that without the likes of Dell, we'd be taken to the cleaners by other vendors. It's thanks to the likes of Dell that we are seeing prices which are so low it begs the question of how do they manage that? We've never seen PCs been sold so cheap...I understand that the margins are so tight in desktops and notebooks (negative in a lot of instances) that it's hardly worth the effort of making them. Remember, the mighty IBM gave up and sold out to Lenovo!

This is bound to hit all other vendors, if not so already, at some stage in any case. Dell's model of building to order means that current shortages are reflected in current orders whereas other vendors would've had some stock in the channel but this is bound to run out and they'd eventually face the same problems or worse!

Be patient, stay loyal under the current climate and it'll all be forgotten in few months time.