are ANY computers made in the USA anymore?

[wordpix]

I need a new laptop and a computer made in the USA is my top pick; however, in my search so far, I can't find any. Nothing, zip, nada.

Does anyone know of a good laptop made in the US?

[DBoon]

1. How about Union Built PCs

http://www.unionbuiltpc.com/

[originalpckelly]

4. Even some of their components are foreign.

It is assembled by union workers at least.

[TexasProgresive]

8. Just so you know

There never were any completely US made PCs ever. Before the personal computer a vast amount of INTEL and other chip makers were outsourcing their chips to Singapore and other East Asian countries. My experience goes back to before 1970.

[Poll_Blind]

13. From my experience, this is entirely factually correct.

I think there might have been an all-UK made PC at one point but that may have been before the 80's. It would be great, though, if there were all-US-made PC's available.

PB

[Brickbat]

2. You can try Union Built PCs.

unionbuiltpc.com

[Warren Stupidity]

3. At best they are assembled in the USA.

The manufacturing of the parts that go into them is almost all off-shored.

[backscatter712]

7. Depends on the component.

Motherboards, other circuit boards are almost always made in China or Taiwan or otherwise offshore these days.

But Intel still has some of their chip fab plants here in the USA...

AMD's chip-fab facilities (now their own company) are in Dresden, Germany, IIRC.

[tridim]

5. DIY is the only way, but you still have to buy some parts from overseas.

My PC is currently about 30% made in the USA, 100% assembled in the USA. That's about the best I can do.

[Tesha]

19. Where was the motherboard stuffed/soldered?

I'll bet it *WASN'T* the US.

Tesha

[Statistical]

22. Well that is why he said 30% US not 100% US. Most CPU are still made in US.

If your video card is AMD the GPU might be made in US also.

[PBS Poll-435]

24. AMD GPUs (and Nvidia GPUs) are made by TSMC in Taiwan nt

[Statistical]

38. True. I forgot GF Fab in NY isn't up and running yet.

When it begins production runs in late 2011 or early 2012 it will be one of only 3 28nm Fab in the world and the only one AMD will have access to.

http://www.globalfoundries.com/manufacturing/300mm.aspx

[tridim]

36. MB is Taiwan, CPU and RAM are American.

Audio system is mostly American, GPU, HD's and Case are probably from Taiwan.

That's about 30% give or take. I'd love to buy an American made MB, if we only made one.

[backscatter712]

6. There are still small computer shops who'll custom-build a PC for you.

Go local!

[leveymg]

12. Excellent suggestion! That's how I got this one.

It's a reconditioned 2 year old Dell ATG D620 - ruggedized ex-law enforcement - magnesium case, water and shock resistant, practically indestructible. Originally cost $2500, bought from the repair shop second-hand complete with a new 250 Gig Cenrino Duo hard-drive and Windows XP installed for $600. Even came with a full one-year parts and labor warrantee.

I traded the original 62 Gig solid-state hard-drive for additional memory. The conventional hard drive they put in isn't as shock-resistant, but I don't plan on air-dropping it.

Like the Blues Bros Bluesmobile. "Got a Cop motor. Cop shocks. Cop brakes."

[lumberjack_jeff]

17. But does it have SCMODS?

[leveymg]

20. No, but I'm pretty sure I'm in that data base: "ARREST DRIVER. . . IMPOUND VEHICLE."

[Posteritatis]

41. The parts they'll custom-build with are from all over the place, though

A 100% American-built computer simply isn't possible, though it's good to get as close to local as you can given the limitations of the whole industry.

Also, if you're going PC, a good custom-builder can help in terms of bang:buck ratio, spotting any possible issues your system might have, etc.

[CBGLuthier]

9. I don't think a laptop has been made in this country for decades.

If ever. At least not the modern idea of laptops. Osbourne made something 30 years ago.

[madrchsod]

10. you mean assembled in the usa?

try a local computer shop

[mwooldri]

11. Assembled in USA is best you're going to get.

I can't recall seeing some actual "Made in USA" components in quite some time. Now the processors and other stuff may be part designed in the USA but the actual manufacture is very unlikely USA.

[Statistical]

14. processor is the one thing which might actually be made in US.

Intel has many FAB located in the United States. All the top of the line (32nm) parts are fabricated in the US.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_manufacturing_sites

AMD manufacturing arm is Global Foundries. "Fab 8" is one of the most advanced fab in the world (28nm) and is located in NY. Should begin production in 2012.

Now memory/RAM, hard drives, motherboards, auxillery cards, Graphics cards, etc. Yup almost 100% overseas.

We still make CPU here though.

[IDemo]

15. Still some NAND flash and DRAM as well

but the bulk of it has been moved overseas.

[Tesha]

28. Micron's, maybe.

(And the product of their joint venture with Intel.)

But not ST's, Toshiba's, Samsung's, nor Infineon's
(ex Siemens). Most flash, like most of all semiconductors,
is made off-shore.

Tesha

[backscatter712]

33. And there's lots of R&D here in the U.S.

NVidia might make their GPUs overseas, but they're designed here. They have a facility in my hometown.

As does Intel, AMD, HP...

[mwooldri]

47. Thanks for the correction :)

I thought Intel etc had offshored most of its chip manufacturing facilities. Seems I'm wrong. Pleasantly so :)

[Ichingcarpenter]

16. The Only american thing your really consume is your food

Oh, sure T shirts...........

Now where are those mills now that make those shirts?
I would like to know


WE MAKE GREAT WEAPONS TO SELL

THE CHIPS ARE MADE FOR THE PLANE



ARE INTERNATIONAL.

[2Design]

34. lot of food is coming in from south america - fruits is one

[provis99]

44. my tomatoes come from Mexico, my lamb from New Zealand,

my beef from Canada, my chocolate from France, my sardines are from Morocco, my olive oil is from Spain, etc. I can't find any food that I have that comes from the US.

[Tesha]

18. It depends how you define "built".

If you define it as "the last few bits are screwed together in the
United States", then yes, a few computers are "built" in the United
States.

But if you define "built" as where all of the value-add operations
occur, then no, no computer is built entirely or even "mostly"
in the United States. All of the semiconductors in the computer
are assembled in the Far East and most of the semiconductor
wafer processing is done there as well (with a few bits done
at Intel "fabs" in the United States). (Essentially) all of the
capacitors are manufactured in China. The motherboards are
assembled in the Far East. The hard drives are built in the
Far east.

All in all, there's probably *NO* computer that has more than
about 5% of it's value-added operations done on-shore.

Tesha

[Statistical]

23. Most CPU/GPU wafer processing isn't done in Asia.

Not sure where you get that crazy idea from.

Intel has 5 plants (FAB) capable of processing wafers into modern CPU using 45nm & 32nm process.
Four are located in the US and one is located in Israel.

Every current gen CPU sold in the last couple years was wafered either in the US (80%) or in Israel (20%).

Of course the bogus meme that "the US doesn't make ANYTHING" is hard to overcome.

[Tesha]

25. The wafers may be made in non-Far East fabs but *NO*...

...sawing/packaging is done state-side any more (except
possibly some small-lot/prototype runs).

The wafers are tested and then they and and their electronic
wafermaps from wafer-probe testing are sent to the Far East
where the wafers are sawn, sorted, die-attached, and bonded
into their packaging. They are then final-tested in the Far
East as well.

Tesha

[PBS Poll-435]

26. Yep

After leaving the Fabs in Dresden (and soon to be New York!), AMD (Global Foundries) sends the 300mm wafers to Malaysia to cut, bond, test, and package.

:)

[Statistical]

27. Still the lions share of the profit (or value added) is in fabrication.

The sawing, bonding, sorting, and testing is a low profit, low skill, high volume operation.

Fabrication is the high tech, high profit, highly skilled labor operation. 90%+ of computers in the world have a CPU which began as a wafer in a US multi-billion fabrication plant.

[PBS Poll-435]

30. 90%+ No. nt

[Tesha]

32. The wafer fabbing is almost entirely automated.

That's part of the reason why the fabs cost upwards of a
billion dollars. The 300mm generation was just about the
end of human involvement with wafer processing.

Tesha

[Statistical]

35. ROFL.

Highly automated and as a result very highly paid high tech jobs.

Kinda the exact type of job we want to keep here.

[Tesha]

39. Yeah, all twelve of them.

> Kinda the exact type of job we want to keep here.

Yeah, all twelve of them.

(I'm exaggerating, but not by a lot. You'll find a lot
more SMIFs than humans in a modern wafer fab.)

Tesha

[leeroysphitz]

21. A few.

[valerief]

31. Whoa, that's worse than Christmas lights. nt

[valerief]

29. America makes guns, I think, and debt. Lots of debt. nt

[hunter]

37. There's some nifty restorations going on at the Computer History Museum.

PDP-1 Restoration

The PDP-1 restoration project began in fall 2003 and was fully restored by fall 2005. Over the course of the restoration, the team retrieved the data from the main memory, restored all peripherals and successfully ran vintage programs, including SpaceWar!, one of the first computer games.

http://www.computerhistory.org/restorations

[Tesha]

40. That looks like one Expensive Typewriter to me! (NT)

[Ezlivin]

42. Colossus

But then it became aware of Guardian and things went downhill....

[Initech]

43. Try building a desktop yourself.

You get a far superior computer than you would ever buy from Dell, HP, etc. It's not that hard and you can do it in less than a day.

[Tesha]

45. And you will have contributed *MAYBE* 0.1% of the value-add that went into that computer.

If you really want to claim to have "built your own computer",
you at least need to have soldered it together. Spending ten
minutes with a screwdriver doesn't really count.

Tesha

[Blue_In_AK]

46. I always have mine built by a local computer store/repair place,

but I'm sure the components come from elsewhere.