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Realtek Also Experiences Chip Shortage, Could Reflect Badly on PC Market

AleksandarK

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The global chip shortage is currently getting worse each day, starting from the tight supply of graphics cards and processors for consumers, spanning to even your internet router. Every piece of electronics now seems to be getting more expensive, as the semiconductor processors found inside them are very hard to source. The cause of that is huge demand coming from consumers, who require the latest generation of processors manufactured in overbooked semiconductor facilities like the ones from TSMC, UMC, Intel, Samsung, SMIC, etc. If manufacturers can't supply enough chips to satisfy the demand for companies that incorporate these chips in products' needs, the issue appears.

This time, we have another big player in need of more wafer capacity. Realtek, the maker of various ICs for multimedia and peripherals, is reportedly experiencing a chip shortage as well. According to the report coming from DigiTimes, the Taiwanese Realtek is fighting to keep up with the demand. The report raises concerns from laptop manufacturers like Dell, HP, and others who use Realtek's chips for various purposes in devices, like audio and LAN chips. Reportedly used in 70% of global laptop designs, Realtek's audio and LAN solutions are very much in demand. If the company cannot supply enough of those chips, manufacturers would be unable to ship products. According to the report, the delivery time of Realtek's chips has been extended to 32 weeks, which could cause massive delays with product shipments and cause some harm to the supply chain. It remains to be seen how the market responds to the extended delivery time, so we will watch it with caution.


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not a big loose for industry , realtek product can be easly change with chinese product ..
 

TheLostSwede

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This is what happens when everyone cancels their foundry orders and then realise that it's business as usual or even higher demand than normally, six months later.

not a big loose for industry , realtek product can be easly change with chinese product ..
Yeah? Please enlighten us which products those are and in which foundry they're being made in the same quantity.
 
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Another price hikes for motherboard.
 
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Another price hikes for motherboard.

Third time's the charm lol

Or a new product line of motherboards shipped without built in sound, Realtek LAN/Wi-Fi cards. Most manufacturers can switch over to Intel chips for those. Wi-Fi offers more choices as far as alternative chipsets go. As far as soundcards go. Asus will be hit the hardest as realtek chips also power some of their Xonar cards. And Creative dont really do built-in soundcards so choices are limited.
 
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Or a new product line of motherboards shipped without built in sound, Realtek LAN/Wi-Fi cards. Most manufacturers can switch over to Intel chips for those. Wi-Fi offers more choices as far as alternative chipsets go. As far as soundcards go. Asus will be hit the hardest as realtek chips also power some of their Xonar cards. And Creative dont really do built-in soundcards so choices are limited.
well AKM is doing 8 channel dac, and also makes ADC, but they got a fire problem :
ESS is going to be overpriced by name alone
all that's left (as far as my knowledge goes) are texas instrument and cirrus logic (the latter is used by apple)
 
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in other news "cheese price will rise 10x due to chip shortage causing lack of GPS chips for tracking cows"
 
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Or a new product line of motherboards shipped without built in sound, Realtek LAN/Wi-Fi cards. Most manufacturers can switch over to Intel chips for those. Wi-Fi offers more choices as far as alternative chipsets go. As far as soundcards go. Asus will be hit the hardest as realtek chips also power some of their Xonar cards. And Creative dont really do built-in soundcards so choices are limited.

Realtek is already most basic option of all sound and network chips, you can't go any lower than that while retaining good support. Remember back then when VIA, IDT and Conexant sound chip suddenly unrecognizable by Windows 10? ESS would be good alternative although I might suspect they also got their hand full because Apple, and for the records Asus never uses Realtek for sound chip, they either uses CMedia ( rebranded as Asus AV series for their add on ) or ESS for some ( rebranded as SupremeFX for integrated). As for network cards, you know that Intel is already cost more than Realtek right? Although I might say Broadcomm and Marvell could make a comeback.

Edited :
Yeah, Asus uses Realtek sound chip. My bad.
 
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