CF card costs? How far down will they go?

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00 ($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00 ($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00 ($1.00/mb).

Now I am seeing 128mb cards for $99.00 ($0.77/mb). Admittedly this is a very unscientific comparison. No ancilliery costs are included. Sources vary. Card speed and quility is ignored (That's just one more big argumentive hassle, anyway.) But it is illustrative of the drop in cost for our digital 'film'. (Don't you wish Kodak and Fuji had done this in the 70's and 80's?)

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see $.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I? :^) PatiO.

PatiO said:

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see
$.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and
projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I?
:^) PatiO.

Click to expand...

I've been involved with computers to know that one very popular media or memory type is soon replaced by another that works better and is cheaper to manufacture. When a new media type is introduced and being adopted, prices are high. As it becomes more and more popular (volume of sales increases) prices drop, drop, drop. At some point, new or other competing media types take away too much of the market share and manufacturers switch production away from making so much of the older, and focus on the newer.

Then you see prices stabilize or even go up if demand outstrips supply for the older type.

A case in point is that RAM for my newer Macs is cheaper than for my older Macs.

I don't have any idea how long the cycle may be for CF Type I, but it seems like new models of cameras being introduced are beginning to move beyond CF Type I more and more, right?

I would predict that prices will continue to drop as CF type I becomes more and more a commodity (now that manufacturing R&D costs have been paid for). But at some point that will stop.

I'd guess the way to predict how far (and when) CF Type I prices will fall is to keep track of how popular the devices using it are. I'd think that as long as lots of pro-sumer and especially the plentiful consumer cameras are bing used, the market will be viable and prices will be cheap.

How about that -- some babblings and loose thoughts without any kind of committed answer to your inquiry.

== jim

PatiO said:

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00
($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00
($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00
($1.00/mb).

Click to expand...

Plotting your points on a graph, it appears that they will be paying you to take the flash cards in just 2 months.
Bryan

PatiO said:

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00
($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00
($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00
($1.00/mb).

Now I am seeing 128mb cards for $99.00 ($0.77/mb). Admittedly this
is a very unscientific comparison. No ancilliery costs are
included. Sources vary. Card speed and quility is ignored (That's
just one more big argumentive hassle, anyway.) But it is
illustrative of the drop in cost for our digital 'film'. (Don't
you wish Kodak and Fuji had done this in the 70's and 80's?)

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see
$.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and
projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I?
:^) PatiO.

Click to expand...

I can recall purchasing a 40 MEG hard drive for my first PC many moons ago at a cost of $695 + installation. I suspect that these cards are going to go the same route, less expensive for better performance. Where they go and how soon is anyone's guess, but I like the current trend.

Richard.

Last weekend I bought 2 64mb 8X Lexars at Compusa for $69 after instant and mail in rebates.

Richard King said:

PatiO said:

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00
($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00
($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00
($1.00/mb).

Now I am seeing 128mb cards for $99.00 ($0.77/mb). Admittedly this
is a very unscientific comparison. No ancilliery costs are
included. Sources vary. Card speed and quility is ignored (That's
just one more big argumentive hassle, anyway.) But it is
illustrative of the drop in cost for our digital 'film'. (Don't
you wish Kodak and Fuji had done this in the 70's and 80's?)

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see
$.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and
projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I?
:^) PatiO.

Click to expand...

I can recall purchasing a 40 MEG hard drive for my first PC many
moons ago at a cost of $695 + installation. I suspect that these
cards are going to go the same route, less expensive for better
performance. Where they go and how soon is anyone's guess, but I
like the current trend.

Richard.

Click to expand...

I remember having 24MB of ram in my Pentium 75, at a cost of $50/MB, the total was $1200

Now you can get 128MB for around $50...

Richard King said:

PatiO said:

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00
($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00
($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00
($1.00/mb).

Now I am seeing 128mb cards for $99.00 ($0.77/mb). Admittedly this
is a very unscientific comparison. No ancilliery costs are
included. Sources vary. Card speed and quility is ignored (That's
just one more big argumentive hassle, anyway.) But it is
illustrative of the drop in cost for our digital 'film'. (Don't
you wish Kodak and Fuji had done this in the 70's and 80's?)

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see
$.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and
projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I?
:^) PatiO.

Click to expand...

I can recall purchasing a 40 MEG hard drive for my first PC many
moons ago at a cost of $695 + installation. I suspect that these
cards are going to go the same route, less expensive for better
performance. Where they go and how soon is anyone's guess, but I
like the current trend.

Richard.

Click to expand...

In 1980, I paid $120 for 16K (yes K) for my TRS-80 Model 1

If my math is correct, that comes to $7,500 a mb. A 64MB card would have cost almost 1/2 million dollars.

Gene said:

Now you can get 128MB for around $50...

Richard King said:

PatiO said:

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00
($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00
($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00
($1.00/mb).

Now I am seeing 128mb cards for $99.00 ($0.77/mb). Admittedly this
is a very unscientific comparison. No ancilliery costs are
included. Sources vary. Card speed and quility is ignored (That's
just one more big argumentive hassle, anyway.) But it is
illustrative of the drop in cost for our digital 'film'. (Don't
you wish Kodak and Fuji had done this in the 70's and 80's?)

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see
$.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and
projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I?
:^) PatiO.

Click to expand...

I can recall purchasing a 40 MEG hard drive for my first PC many
moons ago at a cost of $695 + installation. I suspect that these
cards are going to go the same route, less expensive for better
performance. Where they go and how soon is anyone's guess, but I
like the current trend.

Richard.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

In '76, I was part of a group that built up an Altair 8080, one of the first home computers. It came as a kit. I remember that the memory board had a total of 1K of Ram. This was a tube of chips and a bare board. Cost for 1K of ram; 1000.00 dollars (one thousand).

Wayne Davis said:

Gene said:

Now you can get 128MB for around $50...

Richard King said:

PatiO said:

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00
($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00
($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00
($1.00/mb).

Now I am seeing 128mb cards for $99.00 ($0.77/mb). Admittedly this
is a very unscientific comparison. No ancilliery costs are
included. Sources vary. Card speed and quility is ignored (That's
just one more big argumentive hassle, anyway.) But it is
illustrative of the drop in cost for our digital 'film'. (Don't
you wish Kodak and Fuji had done this in the 70's and 80's?)

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see
$.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and
projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I?
:^) PatiO.

Click to expand...

I can recall purchasing a 40 MEG hard drive for my first PC many
moons ago at a cost of $695 + installation. I suspect that these
cards are going to go the same route, less expensive for better
performance. Where they go and how soon is anyone's guess, but I
like the current trend.

Richard.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

I remember when I bought a 40meg hard drive, I paid 400$ at the time. Less than one year later the cost was 200$ for a drive twice as big. If hard drives are a example, I would think by the end of the year with the economy the way it is, it should bottom out about .40 to .65 a meg for compact flash, in the near future. But prices will continue to drop per meg for flash products just like hard drive prices......

Richard King40278 said:

I can recall purchasing a 40 MEG hard drive for my first PC many
moons ago at a cost of $695 + installation. I suspect that these
cards are going to go the same route, less expensive for better
performance. Where they go and how soon is anyone's guess, but I
like the current trend.

Richard.

Click to expand...

PatiO said:

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00
($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00
($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00
($1.00/mb).

Now I am seeing 128mb cards for $99.00 ($0.77/mb). Admittedly this
is a very unscientific comparison. No ancilliery costs are
included. Sources vary. Card speed and quility is ignored (That's
just one more big argumentive hassle, anyway.) But it is
illustrative of the drop in cost for our digital 'film'. (Don't
you wish Kodak and Fuji had done this in the 70's and 80's?)

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see
$.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and
projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I?
:^) PatiO.

Click to expand...

Another poster reports a 128mb card for $86.00 at newegg.com. That is $.067mb. We're getting down there... ;^) PatiO.

Search on 'cf cards'...

http://www.newegg.com/

I would think it would depend on how much is in their inventories and what new products are coming down the line to be introduced for Xmas. Second, if Windows XP doesn't ship way before Xmas, the computer, software, and electronic retail industries will have a sad Xmas. Finally, the economy and consumer sentiment will a impact sales as we go into the fourth quarter. I am sure there are other factors I have forgotten. 50 cents per MB would be nice but I wouldn't hold my breath too long.

Regards,
Trent

PatiO said:

Last year I bought a major brand 32mb CF card for $230.00
($7.18/mb). Early this year I bought a 64mb card for $132.00
($2.06/mb). Just recently I bought a 128mb card for $128.00
($1.00/mb).

Now I am seeing 128mb cards for $99.00 ($0.77/mb). Admittedly this
is a very unscientific comparison. No ancilliery costs are
included. Sources vary. Card speed and quility is ignored (That's
just one more big argumentive hassle, anyway.) But it is
illustrative of the drop in cost for our digital 'film'. (Don't
you wish Kodak and Fuji had done this in the 70's and 80's?)

My point - How far do you all think it will go? Will we see
$.050mb? Or $.25mb? I am looking in my crystal ball and
projecting $0.35 - $0.45mb by the end of 2001. How far off am I?
:^) PatiO.

Click to expand...

Member said:

Plotting your points on a graph, it appears that they will be
paying you to take the flash cards in just 2 months.
Bryan

Click to expand...

Only Sony should be paying its customers to use its Memory Stick since it's proprietary to Sony products.