Ready for some memory loss?: Major hard drive shortage coming
Dan Seitz 
Thinking about getting a new computer? Now would be the time to pull the trigger. Thanks to our wonderfully globalized supply chain, everything’s cheaper than ever, but one bad day means a cascade of prices increases and problems.
Guess what all the flooding in Thailand CNN mentioned maybe twice is going to do!
The problem is this: a Thai company known as Nimec provides hard drive motors for seventy to eighty percent of all hard drive manufacturers. It also happens to be completely underwater, thanks to the worst flooding Thailand has experienced in more than fifty freakin’ years. Nimec, in polite analyst-speak, will have “limited capacity”; i.e. all its employees are trying to save their houses and their equipment is destroyed. Essentially, it’s like expecting New Orleans to turn around and start cranking out more oil and Girls Gone Wild videos right after Katrina.
It gets worse, if you’re looking for a hard drive: Western Digital, one of the biggest names in hard drives, currently has two factories in Thailand. One’s underwater and the other is in the process of going underwater.
All is not lost: after all, there are other hard drive motor manufacturers. It’s just that you may be finding yourself paying a bit more for good old magnetic storage. If you want to avoid the costs, might we recommend buying some flash memory?
Hard drives could get scarce: Apple, analysts [CNET]
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