Get Ready To Pay More For Laptops, Computer Components In 2022; Here’s Why

TSMC is the world's most valuable semiconductor company, which manufactures chips for brands like Apple, Mediatek, Nvidia, AMD, and even Intel. A new report from DigiTimes indicates that TSMC is raising the prices of chips manufactured using matured and advanced nodes by 10 to 20 percent.

This will affect all sorts of computing products, including AMD's current CPUs and GPUs which uses 7nm node, and the upcoming products which will be fabbed using the 5nm process. Hence, both the current and the upcoming products of AMD will cost a lot more than what they currently cost.

Although the current RTX 30 series of GPUs are fabbed by Samsung, the report suggests that NVIDIA will use TSMC's foundry to manufacture the upcoming RTX 40 series of GPUs using a 5nm process. In fact, NVIDIA is also said to have made an advanced payment to reserve the foundry. Again, the rise in prices will also make the upcoming RTX 40 series GPUs even more expensive.

Given there is a huge shortage of GPUs, the RTX 40 series of GPUs will be even more expensive than the current RTX 30 series of GPUs, mainly due to scalpers and crypto miners. Since Intel is using TSMC to manufacture their upcoming ARC GPUs, you can expect a price hike for the same. However, it might not affect Intel CPUs, as Intel manufactures them in-house.

The DigiTimes report concludes with a fact that 2022 might be a bad year for PC enthusiasts, especially due to the sharp rise in the component price. As of now, it is unclear if this will also affect the smartphone industry, as companies like Mediatek and Apple also use TSMC to manufacture their chips using the latest 5nm and 4nm nodes.

Qualcomm might be the only chip company that won't be affected by this move. Both the Snapdragon 8 Gen1 and the Snapdragon 888 SoC are being manufactured by Samsung. Nonetheless, PC enthusiasts have to get ready to pay more, as OEMs will definitely pass on this price hike to the customers hence the end product will cost more.

Source | Via