Question are video card prices headed down yet?

[GunsMadeAmericaFree]

For about a year and a half, I kept hearing that video card prices were high due to the pandemic. Now that folks have their shots, folks are going out to concerts & such again,
have prices started edging back down any meaningful amount?

 

[psolord]

You DO realize, that there's an order-of-magnitude difference in the energy-consumption between Ethereum mining, and Bitcoin mining, and also, that computer chip that you're using to post this, used quite a bit of energy and water to manufacture. Maybe you should be getting on that bike as well...

I wrote this message from a PC that is actually used to do some REAL WORK, ie monitoring and supplying medical devices, that people with BROKEN BONES are being operated with, to get well.

Yeah I'd say that this kind of work, is much more important than producing imaginary harry potter money out of....the ether. There's a reason it's called ETHERium and BITcoin. Even the names are stupid.

Also even regarding gaming, yeah mental venting is much more important than some of you freaking idiots, making your fat wallets even fatter with imaginary money, at the expense of others' enjoyment. To hell with you.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

I hate this “scalper” talk.
IMO to scalp something it really needs to be something that MUST be had. Like baby food or gas after a blizzard or hurricane or tornado.
The idea that one can scalp a video card which is made to play games, not power a monitor for a business or home machine is a perversion of the word “scalping”.
Nobody is required to be able to run a game at 100+ fps. Life continues as always with your old video card that runs the same damn game at 30 fps on medium settings.

I am prepared to be down voted.

 

[igor_kavinski]

What down vote? I see Like, Love, HaHa, and Wow.

 

[VirtualLarry]

If i knew he was gonna flip it to a miner, i wouldn't of sold it to him and kept it for myself.

I hear ya!

I've given people cards out of my stash for gaming purposes, if they re-sold them on me, I'd be ticked too.

After all, I could have theoretically mined on them too.

 

[moonbogg]

You can't fix this with supply even if you release 10 million cards every week into the market for the next several years. If mining profitability is there, you have people or groups that will buy millions of GPUs in one purchase. They will literally buy them all and they won't stop buying them all, every week, until profitability is completely dead. GPUs print money, guys. What else would you expect to happen? People claiming that supply can fix this, how much supply would do it? I'm willing to bet that if there was suddenly enough supply to actually meet everyone's demand, there would be a very serious energy crisis.
You'd have hundreds of millions of 3080's all running full blast around the clock. It would be completely ridiculous and would completely crash energy infrastructure overnight. You'd also need other components to be made in astronomical quantities, such as PSUs, boards, risers, etc. You'd need the entire world to stop everything else and start making components for miners. It would require a global effort beyond the scale of a catastrophic world war in terms of emergency production. I think people completely underestimate how much demand there really is from miners. It's astronomically high because everyone wants free money and they will stop at nothing to get it. Keep in mind that if supply was magically adequate, demand would not stop but INCREASE. People would see that it works and literally everyone on earth would want to start mining. Everyone! Shoot, I'd start mining! I'd sell the minivan and buy a bunch of GPUs! Free money? Count me in!

 

[maddie]

Very emotive thread. Battle of the down votes, fun. Trying for another one, will I succeed.

 

[maddogmcgee]

Agreed. I thought he was meming but seems he was genuinely angry at miners. The idea that you could give large numbers of people the chance to make money for little work and have none of those people choose do it is absurd. I wonder if he screams IRL at miners buying video cards in shops and sends angry letters to AMD and NVIDIA.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Sorry, gamers, that you can't find cards!

 

[SteveGrabowski]

Again "GPU prints money" has been happening since 2010, yet it is only a major problem now

?? It was a major problem in the last ether boom in 2017 or 2018 until ether crashed. It was a major problem in the Litecoin boom until that got unprofitable to mine on gpus like Hawaii.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Merriam Webster says otherwise. Definition #3 when used as a transitive verb.

Definition of SCALP

the part of the integument of the human head usually covered with hair in both sexes; the part of an animal (such as a wolf or fox) corresponding to the human scalp; a part of the human scalp with attached hair cut or torn from an enemy as a token of victory… See the full definition

www.merriam-webster.com

It sure does and by its definition pretty much any modern business is “scalping” reselling a product quickly to make a profit. This certainly is Amazon, Walmart, Best Buy, Nordstroms, any fast casual food place. The definition is extremely broad.
I am a gamer, I have wanted a new monitor for at least two years. Price of a decent card to drive a new monitor is absurd. The card purchase alone breaks my budget and using a 3080 on a 1050 monitor at 59hrtz is dumb.
Point is nearly nobody needs a 3080 beside some photoshop or digital art people, some people who do oddball calculations and so on. I agree a 3080 is a premier gaming experience however the two or three year old card is likely a perfectly fine gaming experience, to say you must have a 3080 to game is simply setting the bar far too high.

 

[psolord]

First sale doctrine. Here in the USA, for the most part, if it's a tangible good, if you can buy it on the open market, you can re-sell it on the open market, legally. You don't need a reseller license to use ebay, craigslist, offerup, etc.


Now run along little socialist gamer, and find some commie country with a top-down command economy to take you in and provide gpus for you at subsidized rates.

I couldn't care less what idiocy is the normal, there in the US. You sell guns in donut shops, measure things in feet, legs, hands and stadium lengths, charge an arm and a leg for insulin shots and most people are one broken leg away from bankruptcy thanks to your stupid medical system.

Selling some items you own is normal in all countries. Doing this repeatedly makes you a professional and moves you to a different taxing segment. I mean your IRS sees an individual repeatedly buying and selling stuff without the individual being on a specific taxing/professional segment and it's OK?

If your laws allow unlawfulness, it's your problem really. You cannot possibly have a lawfully abiding merchant on equal taxing terms with any idiot that decides to be a merchant without a shop.

Comie country in the EU? Don't think so.

 

[Golgatha]

That's why GPUs need to have blockchain tech embedded in them for chain of custody. Show how many times the GPU has changed hands and also how much it has been used by who.

Things have gone from serious gamers to insane miners. A miner stresses a GPU far more than a gamer so even buying used GPUs after they flood the market due to crypto crash will still mean getting something with lower usable life. Solder joints may come loose due to past thermal stresses, capacitors may leak/burst or fans may fail prematurely. I'm sure no one wants any of these things happening to their $400 used entry level GPU, let alone the expensive ones.

So, I've thought about this a bit lately. I don't care about chain of custody, but I would like something equivalent to SMART monitoring for these expensive GPUs. Maybe power on hours, average temperature, percentage of time above 90% utilization, etc.

 

[Golgatha]

Looks like prices have been coming down for 4 months.

https://www.techradar.com/deals/looking-for-a-gpu-dont-buy-yet-graphics-card-prices-are-falling-rapidly

 

[Shmee]

Hey guys, please remember to stay on topic, remain civil, and keep politics out of the GPU section.

 

[OscaAndShintjee]

Retail prices for most graphics cards where I live have dropped by 30-40% since January. Definitely an improvement, though the prices are far from acceptable even now.

 

[Ranulf]

Oh, you just wait for the 4000 series pricing. It's going to be absolutely hilarious. The price doesn't matter anymore though because the entire 4000 series generation is going to get botted and scalped to death anyway. The whole generation of GPUs over the entire lifecycle are going to get botted and scalped. Nearly every single one. You watch. Day one will will go from "coming soon" to "out of stock" in a single monitor frame, and 30 seconds later there will be thousands of scalped offers at 3X msrp all over the online markets, and it will stay that way until the 5000 series drops 2 years later. And gamers will buy those cards at 3X msrp without batting an eye. They won't even take time to blink, they will just make a fist and start slamming their keyboards until their credit card information goes through.

Seriously or otherwise, I don't think the inflated market will hold. You'll have the fanatics who will do as you say but most won't. Burnout is real. Nvidia isn't as diversified yet to drop gamers unless they have miners.

At least thats the hope. That we can go back to inflated turing prices and griping about that as people justify it for RTX research costs and inflation (that seems quaint now that we have real inflation). Things are so in flux right now, its impossible to call for sure.

It's not only neon that's affected, so I don't think problems will be limited to just the semiconductor industry.

Everything is getting shockingly expensive right now. F.x. petrol (gasoline to North Americans) / diesel is right on the path to set a new price record here in Denmark. The previous record was back in '82 I think.

Gas went up in my town by 10-12 cents in a day this week. One station near me is $4.01/gal cash price. Credit is 10 cents more. Thats for 87 octane. I imagine by the summer it will be almost double what we paid here in early 2020.

 

[moonbogg]

I'm so hopelessly bitter that I honestly just want the entire industry to burn to the ground at this point. From Roblox to abacus, the children would be better off. I want the RTX 4080 to cost $2500 and I want to see Jensen's face when he tries to sell us on it. I'd absolutely love it. I want to see people freak out and complain about the price, and then see the look on their face when they realize that their impulsive, garbage neurological structure is the reason for this hobby's demise. I want it all to burn. I want the RTX 4060 to gain much hype from the masses as their big hope of a great mid range upgrade, then have Jensen reveal the price: $799. I'd absolutely love it. Nothing would make me happier and more entertained than to see the logical conclusion of these constant price hikes finally come to fruition: perfect unaffordability for absolutely everyone.

 

[lakedude]

I've been waiting for a $500 RTX 3070 for so long I've about got myself talked out of it. There are only really 2 games I want a card that good for, Alyx and The Lab. Spending $1500 on a system to play 2 games 🎮 sounds a bit silly.

My 1660ti MQ plays Alyx OK on low settings except for the 2 big Antlion scenes which bog down.

I think maybe I'll just stick with the 1070 that a friend is giving me, IDK.

 

[kschendel]

If that rumour is true, it'll be extremely low performance. More video output checkbox then actually capable of running anything. Think below Vega3-level, maybe 2CUs (i.e. a single workgroup) worth of RDNA2.

I'd be 100% OK with that. As long as the integrated graphics can run a desktop and play a youtube video, that's enough for me and for lots of people. It would be great to not have to buy crap used GT 710's just to boot and upgrade the workstations.

 

[GunsMadeAmericaFree]

I'd be 100% OK with that. As long as the integrated graphics can run a desktop and play a youtube video, that's enough for me and for lots of people. It would be great to not have to buy crap used GT 710's just to boot and upgrade the workstations.

I'm just a bit annoyed, because the built in video means that there hasn't been much improvent at all in the past few years in low end video cards like there used to be.

 

[moonbogg]

I wouldn't expect to be able to buy a 4000 series until a good 6 months after release, and that's assuming mining has been absolutely dead for months before that. The demand is going to be laughably massive. The kind of thing where you know there's no chance, so you just sit back and watch the madness. Of course, you could always grab a 4090 off ebay for $6000 if you're OK with that.
Also, when it comes to mining, why doesn't someone just make another Ethereum-like coin? People act like it's real or something. I'd imagine the same guys could easily just make another one and call it Derpthereum or something, no?

 

[In2Photos]

I'm still playing at 1080p 144hz so a 3070 is all I'm looking for. I'm just not willing to pay the ridiculous prices for it. Glad things are starting to settle down. Maybe I'll finally get to replace my well used 2009 rig this fall when AM5 releases.

 

[moonbogg]

Keep your expectations low, people. If you want performance and efficiency - RDNA3, not Lovelace.

Lovelace is so little change in perf, that AMD WILL compete with the lower-end lineup with rebadged RDNA2 Navi 23 and 22.

My expectations are sky high that Lovelace will be the most profitable, highest margin release in Nvidia's history. By a long shot, too. I wouldn't be surprised to see people paying $800 for RTX 3080 equivalent performance and being thrilled about it, thinking they got such a great product. Nothing but high hopes from me. Nvidia will just tweet out some stuff about supply chain this, inflation that, and pump the price 2X from last gen because money feels good.

 

[moonbogg]

@dvsv

So uh, you take issue with the possibility of 144 fps @ 4k? Something you wanna say?

(yeah I noticed the downvote which makes no sense)

I have also received downvotes recently. It has shaken me emotionally and I've been forced to evaluate my life choices. Be strong. You'll get through this.
But yeah, of course 4K 144hz is the holy grail for a lot of people out there. They game on really nice OLED TVs or 4K monitors and they are looking for a GPU to drive those panels as easily as existing cards drive 1440p. It's going to cost them because of course, GPU prices are about to skyrocket UP again with the 4000 series.

 

[Frenetic Pony]

As I mentioned, AMD has plenty of competition from their own products basically given they won't/can't get enough wafers. They aren't going cheap either.

They definitely didn't see the huge demand spike and low supply coming when they promised all that priority to Sony and Microsoft. 28 million or so in just over a year. That's, let's see, about 175k wafers. That's 28 million GPUs as the SOCs are about the same average size, and of course take GDDR as well. That'd probably have put a dent in that demand. Well at least someone is gaming with them.

I find the constant belief that mining is cause for the shortage weird. Even more since like 90% of people mentioning it are talking about bitcoin which no one mines on GPUs anyway. Mining with an additional factor but not the main problem at all. Every wondered why there is no shortage or overpricing in gaming laptops? That use the same chips desktop GPUs use and in fact miners also bought in the millions? dGPU market is/was especially bad because contracts with OEMs went firsts and DIY last which made the DIY piece smaller than usually. At miners on top and you got a perfect storm. but stop the non-sense miners are the main cause. How do miners affect car chip production? they don't obviously. Here the compounding factor was just-in-time manufacturing, no chip storage.

There is no cryptocalyps coming. Look at the new Goldman-sachs homepage. Right there on the main page "crypto and metaverse". You know it's not going away when the greediest of greedy are boarding the train.
The reason the used-market is heating up is because ethereum, the main mining crypto, will move to PoS as soon as June. Then mining on GPUs is essentially dead. it sill means it makes sense to wait for a purchase till June/July because then used will get flooded and Intel will also have released their GPU (hopefully). Which means both new and used market should see much, much more supply. Want a 6000-series or 3000-series below msrp? Wait for July.

Hahaha, redacted Goldman Sachs, the idiots leading the charge straight into the 2008 financial crisis are the all seeing knowers of the future. Good god you just mentioned "metaverse" as if it was a serious thing. Anyway.

We have a zero tolerance policy for profanity in the tech sub-forums.
Don't do it again.

Iron Woode
Super Moderator