It seems like you largely agree with the article - people shall own nothing and be happy. Perhaps the artificially induced supply crunch could go on indefinitely.
Also, I wonder how many of us, even here on HN, have the ability to spend that amount of money on computer for personal use. Frankly I wouldn't even know what to do with all the RAM - should I just ramdisk every program I use and every digital thing I made in the last five years?
Anyhow, I suppose for the folks who can't afford hardware (perhaps by design), one ought to own nothing and be happy.
People spend a lot more than that on a car they use less, especially if they're in tech.
The RAM choice was because I have never regretted buying more RAM - it's practically always a better trade than a slightly faster CPU - and 96GB DIMMs were at a sweet spot compared to 128GB DIMMs.
That, and the ability to have big LLMs in memory, for some local inference, even if it's slow mixed CPU/GPU inference, or paged on demand. And if not for big LLMs, then to keep models cached for quick swapping.
I bought a 4 year old car for significantly less than that. And I can get a computer that can do 99% of what your monster can do for like 10% of the price. And if I want LLM inference I can get that for like $20 a month or whatever.
I don't mean to judge, it's your money but to me it seems like an enormous waste. Just like spending $100k on a car when you can get one for $15k that does pretty much exactly the same job.
Sure. You're right, it is my money. And I pay even more for inference on top; I have OpenRouter credits, OpenAI subscription, Claude Max subscription.
It's not so easy to get nice second-hand hardware here in Switzerland, and my HEDT is nice and quiet, doesn't need to be rack-mounted, plugs straight into the wall. I keep it in the basement next to the internet router anyway.
The "sensible" choice is to rent. It's the same with cars; most people these days lease (about 50% of new cars in CH, which will be a majority if you compare it with auto loan and cash purchase).
I don't think leasing cars is sensible. Last time I checked, for cheaper cars mind you, I would essentially pay 60% of the sticker price over a few years and then not have a car at the end of it. Would be better to buy a new car and then sell it after the same time. But what's even better is to not buy a new car, let some other sucker take the huge value loss and then snatch it up at a 30-60% discount a few years later. Then you can sell it a few years after that for not much less than you paid for it. I've had mine a year and right now they're going for more than I paid.
I think leasing might be okayish if you find a really good deal, but it's really not much different than buying new which is just a shit deal no matter how you turn it. A 1-4 year old car is pretty much new anyway, I don't see any reason to buy brand new.
I've always went way over on RAM, for the most part. 32, 64, then 128GB of memory.
Never really used it all, usually only about 40%, but it's one of those better to have than not need, and better than selling and re-buying a larger memory machine (when it's something you can't upgrade, like a Mac or certain other laptops)
Also, I wonder how many of us, even here on HN, have the ability to spend that amount of money on computer for personal use. Frankly I wouldn't even know what to do with all the RAM - should I just ramdisk every program I use and every digital thing I made in the last five years?
Anyhow, I suppose for the folks who can't afford hardware (perhaps by design), one ought to own nothing and be happy.