A businesses purpose is to make money so you can't blame them for latching onto the rarity of a product and hacking up the prices, I'm not saying it's moral, but i certainly don't find it surprising, when has any business corporation been successful from being moral? It just doesn't go hand in hand.
The only power we consumers have is to club together, unfortunately that seems to be against our nature, there's enough show offs and kit junkies out there that want to one up their peers by shelving unnecessarily amounts of cash out for the newest and best kit in spite of their own wallet just to say 'I have this, you don't!' IMO these people let the side down, it's foolish false macho-ism .
As for the whole camp/fan-boy behaviour i really don't get it, i have no loyalty to any company as they have no loyalty to me (first paragraph explains this) those who think they do are truly misinformed, when i build a PC or purchase components i buy the best i can for the money I'm willing to spend with a slight eye on the near future. The company that get's my cash is the one that offers the best goods cheapest... period.
performance/cost/longevity - no amount of branding, advertising, supply issues, rave reviews will detract me from these 3 basic rules.
anyways... bit of a rant and well off topic whoopsies :freak: