I have always been full of things to say about big companies. Not all bad. I don’t hate a big company, because it is big, or good. Or even if it has the only market share. I am very in favour of a good thing being supplied to all people, for at least a profit, but a reasonable profit. There is a big gap between the amount companies earn, and what they pay, their employee’s.

Anyway, this is besides the point I will make, but a small part of the psychology, of what I believe to be a root cause of the issues in hand. I tried to buy an ASUS SLi motherboard. I was in a queue, because it was in short supply. Ok, happens a lot. I tried to order some PCIE NVIDIA 6800GT cards. Also in short supply. Ok. Happens sometimes.

I had tried hard to ignore this new trend, for about 2 years, but find myself, cancelling the whole order, in favour of a release version, or release stock. Then it occurred, all motherboards and graphics cards are sold out, because of low stock. 100% of stock is sold. Now all orders like this are in batches, of just enough, to sell out completely, so the next batch, is – well, hot cakes.

Cynical, or experienced. The latter I think. It all looks like a new ploy to get guaranteed sales, and/or early release dates, for products, that are not ready. Any company is loved by their bank if they can achieve a good pre order. Any company is loved by their bank if they achieve 100% of products sold. Happy banks – happy share holders – fat happy company owners, unhappy consumers.

Example.

NVIDIA released their new GeForce 256 SDR. A card that took us all by storm, so I ordered it. But the week I ordered it, the GTS came out – same price, and available. I call the company to cancel and order the new card. They said “Just refuse the card at the door, once we get it back we will send you the new one.”