QOTD: Do You Think CPUs are Overpriced?

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I dont think the CPUs are overpriced, but I am disappointed in the lack of progress towards integration. It's 2009 and we still dont have a decent SoC solution. Atom is decent but Atom+Ion is way wayyyyy too expensive. I am very disappointed in AMD in particular because I figured they would have a SoC solution by now with a mini-ITX or even smaller motherboard. I want athlon X2 4400+ HD 4550 graphics all in one chip for $99, including the motherboard.
 
Um well according to economic theory i would say that none of it is overpriced. Intel/AMD are going to charge what they think will bring in the most revenue, and as long as customers are paying for these expensive components there won't be major price cuts. All in all it's the customer population's fault that some of these prices get so high. Think about it this way: there wouldn't be a $1000 extreme edition processor from Intel unless there were enough people out their buying them to keep the processor profitable enough for production. If we as consumers want lower prices on the expensive parts, we will have to show that price is a very important factor in a sale and that we are willing to sacrifice some performance if it means saving a good chunk of cash. Another way would be to have more competition in the market such as a third, but smaller player in processor manufacturing for pc consumers.

However, do i think that you are throwing a ton of money away buying these processors? Yes, i do. The hot topic today (or was for a while) is the i7 920 vs. the i7 965 or even 940. With the latest revisions, it is extremely easy to get "extreme" performance out of the 920. Therefore, even for most hardcore users i would say the 920 will more than suffice. Save yourself $700 and go with the 920, or save a little more by going with a new phenom from AMD. It all depends on what your needs are.

Having a monopoly is a completely different story though. I know a lot of people probably would like to accuse Intel of this, but i will stay out of that argument. Intel having a monopoly would mean that they can charge whatever they want because the consumer doesn't have any other option other than ditching a new computer all together. I would say that this cannot be the current case though with the popularity of AMD. I would say AMD and Intel both share a slice of some sort of monopoly.
 
Hell yes! It's hard to find a decent performing CPU for under $200. All the decent CPUs are over $200. Only the crappy budget CPUs are under $100. I think quadcores should be about $150 and the more expensive ones that are insanely priced like the Core i7 965 should be for $300 max and not $1000.

I switched to AMD on grounds that Intel's offers are too expensive especially for people looking to upgrade (and I still see people with ancient setups) in these dire economic times.
 
I don't think they're overpriced. I can get a Q9550 now for the same price I paid 2 years ago for a (visibly slower Q6600). Compare that with a bus ticket (it went up by 20% in the same period, where I live, and there's absolutely no quality improvement there). I'd say Intel and AMD are getting a much tougher deal when it comes to pricing than most other companies.
 
I think this question should be written saying "Do you feel that performance processors are out of your budget?"

there is a difference between overpriced and out of your budget range.
 
I am not going to say whether they are or not. I will simple state a fact. I bought my E8400 on September 2008 @ AU$190 retail price. Now it costs a minimum of AU$220 retail. That means that although Intel refined their production and even though they rolled out Nehalem, the price on an older product still went up (i have seen the E8400 at some AU$300 retail!) and is still up there! Usually older products go down not up in price.
 
A cpu is a very costly investment, often between 1/5th to 1/3th of a complete system (computer case).
I personally find the lower performing processors (Atom) are still way too expensive.
I also find the Corei7 priced far too much!
I'm very pleased with most dual core processors, which are affordable enough, and older processors as well. I don't need a quad core processor, but think some quad cores could reduce in price, especially from Intel.
Compare that to the Phenom II which has internal memory controller on chip, and AMD offers a cheaper alternative for as much performance as the mid segment of intel chips. Granted the I7 is still unbeatable as a CPU, but I don't agree on it's premium price over other processors.
Prices should be somewhat lineair to performance of processors I think.

So to conclude:
AMD has a very nice and competitive pricing policy!
Intel needs to cut on both mid-heavy and heavy segment of their chips, as well as in the mobile segment and the netbook segments for chips.
Their older model chips are priced competitive enough.
 
As said... i think the extreme etc editions are overpriced, but then the bleeding edge usually is.

CPU's are so cheap now its almost unbelievable.

When i was getting into PC's (~1994) $2,000AUD got you a "meh" system. You looked at it and went, "meh"
Today, even though our currencies have devalued and inflated, you can get a "yay!" system for $2,000AUD

While every component has reduced in price to do this, CPU's have played their part well, and thanks to the C2D we FINALLY got a cpu that most people actually felt was fast enough. I know up until that point anything i could get my hands on i always had this nagging disappointing feeling, "is this thing REALLY the fastest?"
 
mainstream and low end processors definetly aren't overpriced. I'm sure they're still earning on them, but then that's the point of a business in the first place. But as stated many times, the highend ones are expensive. And they're milking companies with the expensive opteron and xeon models.
 
Nope.

R&D is expensive.
And the crazy genius' that come up with these improvements deserve a Porsche and Miami beach house.

It gets cheaper and better year, how the hell can you complain? My (2nd or 3rd, can't remember which) computer had 16MB of RAM and, I dare not think what my first did...
 
With out taking in to account the Extreme,etc CPUs most of the CPUs are not that over priced considering what we payed a few years ago for a X2/P4,etc. There are some CPUs that are still a bit over priced but most don't buy those chips anyways.
 
I don't think they're overpriced. Honestly, if most people realized what a CPU does, and how many billions of calculations it does for them, and that it does all that in binary, they would think it's well worth the price.
 
Extreme Editions cannot be over-priced. If they were, noone would be buying them. (I am a believer in market forces.) And their prices would drop. :)

Mainstream chips are fairly priced, especially since Intel could bin them a couple of speed bins higher (reducing the OC headroom) and charge more for them.

I also do not think that motherboards are priced unfairly high.
 
Enthusiast CPUs are overpriced, as are Ferraris, since both cater to a money-is-no-object performance-is-everything crowd. (Unlike CPUs, though, we won't have a Volkswagen next year that can out-perform this year's Ferrari.)

For the rest of them, we're not so much paying for the silicon but for the R&D that went into them and enough profit to motivate future R&D. A thought: if CPUs were even less profitable, would it eliminte progress or accelerate it by making companies develop the Next Big Thing?
 
... it iz not just the cpu... tha all system... if YOU know how to use hardware and software right, then you can do it all with hardware that's cheap... there iz tha element of prestige, that's let tha prices go sky high...
 
The $300 Versace belt and the $1550 QX9775 are obviously overpriced compared to a $10 normal belt and a $270 Q9550. They do the same thing, only a little better, for a lot more money.

However, this overlooks an important aspect. The more expensive items are also useful to attract potential mates. It's like those male frogs in Planet Earth inflating the pouch and making noises. The noisiest frog gets the best chance to transmit his genes to the next generation.
 
Having grown up with computers where just the processor for the bottom line 386 (board and processor) was well over $1000 (heck even bottom line 486/Pentium processors were 500+ when they came out) I would say no, they are fairly cheap now a days in comparison.
 
having started build computers the 286/386 days where bottom line stuff was well over $1000 (heck even bottom line 486/Pentium chips where 500+), i think today's cpus are cheap by comparison. Now even if you went bottom of line i7 your sub $300. There not ever priced.
 
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