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I won't defend the practice for 9GB drives that Donna G mentions. But, there
was a recent thread about PA-RISC and Merced, HP and Intel, in which one
poster divided the cost of developing a chip into the expected chips sold.
If more chips are sold (by Intel than by HP), the cost per chip for its
development can be much lower, $7000 in the example.

Another post claimed that the difference between an 9000 and a 3000 was the
boot prom. Same argument. Divide the cost of providing that particular chip
or the software on it into chips provided.

I'm not sure that this is accurate, I certainly don't like it if it is, and
don't think it is being done fairly WRT the size of the price difference.
But if it is accurate, I do understand that part of it.

#RANT
I had to explain this to someone here who thought that the 3000 was a
'smaller box' than the 9000. I'm fighting for my platform here, and possibly
my career, mainly due to misperceptions and misunderstandings of the 3000.
This poor treatment of the 3000 by HP itself ain't helpin'. I'm being told
to consider learning new technologies - I am learning new technologies! I'm
learning them on the 3000! SAMBA. Apache. If I had the time, I want to learn
(more about) IMAGE/SQL with ODBC, JDBC, Java and perl... I guess someone
would rather I spend my day keeping some silly box running than using it for
something potentially useful.