As it turns out, I did not use my big camera to capture a picture of the hawk that was in my back yard. Not for lack of trying, mind you. Fully charged battery, check. Bird lens, check. I grabbed my memory card out of my card reader and went to slam it into my camera, and. Uh. It wouldn't go in.
Instead I took an exceptionally lousy picture through my landing room window which is not terribly clean at the best of times, and through the screen, with my phone.
I have no idea where the lock switch for that card is. I can tell you exactly where that busted off piece of plastic was: Inside my camera's card slot, trapped by the pins at the bottom of the socket. Hence why I could not get this card or indeed any card to go in far enough to lock, let alone connect. No amount of shaking, tapping, or smacking would dislodge it. I had to retrieve my pair of exceptionally tiny tweezers which naturally were in the garage, which meant going out the back door, which meant scaring off the hawk.
In other news, a direct replacement for this thing now costs three times more than what I originally paid for it, because of course it does.
Gods damned Rampocalypse.
While I wait for my replacement to show up, the largest spare I have on hand that's not already gainfully employed in some other device is apparently a 128 meg one from who knows when. Some time around the turn of the millennium, I'm sure. In case you were wondering, my R10 reckons can fit twenty six full quality exposures onto this card. It's like I'm back to running around with a roll of film.
Needless to say this has rather cramped my style for the last couple of days.
That's what I'm saying. The supply has changed from consumer electronics towards datacenter electronics. Meaning the total silicon consumed hasn't change much. Or do you mean to say the wafer AFTER printing is the same? Could be, I'm not expert, but I doubt it.
No, I mean that the base materials are now being gobbled up by data centers meaning the supply for consumers is less while the demand is the same, causing prices to increase.
It's just that the bottleneck is at the number of machines capable of making semiconductors, of etching silicon, not the amount of silicon wafer itself. Silicon is literally melted down rocks and dirt. Plus, most of the equipment capable of reaching 128GB SD level of density are export restricted which further controls the supply.