The razor business is said to have premiered the following business model: Sell the razor really cheap, but charge a lot for the blades.
Seeing the same in IT isn’t unusual, the prime examples are Inkjet printers where the printer is ridiculously cheap, but a new ink cartridge costs almost the same as the printer.
Cisco memory is another example.
I just noticed the same with HP’s new entry-level 1U server, the HP 120G5. We bought one for evaluation purposes for slightly above 500 €. Seems like a decent hardware: 1GB RAM, a Xeon processor and a single SATA harddisk. No frills, no chrome spoilers, just a straight forward server.
But: no on-board remote management. That would be extra. You need to buy the HP DL120 G5 Lights-Out 100c kit. We just plugged one of these into a DL 180, where we really need it. It’s a very tiny card. Just a PCI-E slot, a RJ45 jack and a single chip:
The price: ~ 200 €.
Sheesh.