Do you think XFX regrets its decision?

TaintedSquirrel

TaintedSquirrel

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So as we know, XFX started producing AMD GPU's back in 2010 and Nvidia cut them off.
As a result XFX became an AMD-only partner.

Do you think XFX believes they made the right choice? I mean they could have passed on AMD and they would still be Nvidia exclusive today, competing with EVGA. I guess I could go dig up their last 5 years of stocks and that would give me a good idea.
 
hindsight is 20/20...they probably believed they were doing the best thing back in 2015...and it still might turn out OK if/when AMD releases a viable threat to Nvidia's dominance...maybe the 390X will be the card
 
No, because they were always second-fiddle to EVGA in terms of cooler design, and support reputation (and lacking features like step-up). Competing directly with a better version of yourself is tough (just ask BFG how hard it is to offer overclocked cards with lifetime warranties :)

Especially when you consider that Asus, Gigabyte and MSI and Palit are the top GPU AND Nvidia OEMs (constantly trading places), you really have to work to carve out some space for yourself among the Nvidia scraps.

XFX AMD is a card designed for people who care more about warranty and service than PCB and cooler build quality, and they've found this combination works. Since they have a better support reputation than Sapphire, I imagine they have a decent market. But it's going to be painful with AMD shrinking.
 
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TaintedSquirrel said:
I guess I could go dig up their last 5 years of stocks and that would give me a good idea.
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The parent company of XFX is Pine Technology Holdings Limited, and its stock price started at $0.20 in 2010, slowly declined to $0.10 over a few years. then suddenly jumped to $0.30 in mid-2013 for some reason I don't know about, and now stays around $0.20 with occasional spikes to $0.30.
 
How many Nvidia partners have gone under since xfx made the switch? Was it just bfg and galaxy?
 
Galaxy didn't go under, they were rebranded along with KFA2 as Galax.
 
Wasn't the reason they went to amd only because of the delay with fermi?
 
Chris_B said:
Wasn't the reason they went to amd only because of the delay with fermi?
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Yeah, delay and they probably really didn't like what they saw with the "baconator" hot card. Add to that some politics between nvidia & evga, and they pretty much had to leave.
 
I think they made a good move. Because anybody looking to purchase nvidia will always go for an EVGA first if possible anyway...
 
LoL... There are more than a few leaks coming from [H]ere posting as news...

Like the time I got the 290x pricing before launch from the newegg.ca mobile site. I posted it here and it turned up as "news" repeated add nauseum across some hardware sites... ;)

Edit: even funnier cause a fake price was planted.
 
A little off topic but why can't EVGA and XFX do both NVIDIA and AMD cards. I have Gigabyte cards that are AMD and NVIDIA.

Why does Gigabyte get to make both NVIDIA and AMD cards? I admit I don't keep up on this stuff and am neither AMD or NVIDIA biased.
 
Aspendancer said:
A little off topic but why can't EVGA and XFX do both NVIDIA and AMD cards. I have Gigabyte cards that are AMD and NVIDIA.

Why does Gigabyte get to make both NVIDIA and AMD cards? I admit I don't keep up on this stuff and am neither AMD or NVIDIA biased.
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Thats a very good point...Doesn't asus still sell both as well? Dirty politics? :rolleyes:
 
I've always assumed it has to do with volume and market reach. The requirements that Nvidia places on a board partner (like what cards are available, and what combinations must be purchased) are more easily handled by big OEMs that move many times more products and have wide distribution channels.

They can also dump a bunch of products through OEM contracts supplying cards to places like Dell/Hp/Etc, which are not the specialty for companies like XFX.

Think about it: if a major OEM like Asus couldn't get the same price as everyone else just because they sell AMD too, they'd drop Nvidia like a rock. Despite what everyone likes to believe, Nvidia is beholden to the large card builders for manufacturing, branding, advertising AND distribution - they'd be sacrificing a major market by cutting-out a major player like Asus. And Asus, being a distributor of many different products, could probably take the loss and expend into another market.

This is why distributors always try to diversify as they grow, so they can't be squeezed by a single source. Since Nvidia needs Asus more than Asus needs Nvidia, you can see why they might be able to do as they please.

I also assume that Nvidia has more preferential treatment for long-time more retail-oriented OEMs like EVGA, but you won't get anything official on that.

That combination of small distribution network, small market share, and shorter lifetime among the premium Nvidia card makers would have made it enticing for XFX to leave. They certainly didn't have the size or cash to handle distribution for both companies.
 
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defaultluser said:
XFX AMD is a card designed for people who care more about warranty and service than PCB and cooler build quality, and they've found this combination works. Since they have a better support reputation than Sapphire, I imagine they have a decent market. But it's going to be painful with AMD shrinking.
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It seems like the initial card releases that are based on the OEM PCB design are all the same anyway?
 
If XFX is about selling cards it might just sell more mid/low entry cards and more of them rather then the exclusive niche cards.

AMD tends to be good in the price performance ratio...
 
TaintedSquirrel said:
So as we know, XFX started producing AMD GPU's back in 2010 and Nvidia cut them off.
As a result XFX became an AMD-only partner.

Do you think XFX believes they made the right choice? I mean they could have passed on AMD and they would still be Nvidia exclusive today, competing with EVGA. I guess I could go dig up their last 5 years of stocks and that would give me a good idea.
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Once the 390X beats TitanX , you will see XFX licking the sweet, sweet tears of NVidia.


latest
 
Chris_B said:
Wasn't the reason they went to amd only because of the delay with fermi?
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was the delay and because nvidia was forcing AIB's other than EVGA to pre-order ridiculous amounts of low end fermi cards before they'd receive the high end cards and XFX was sick of playing that game with nvidia and jumped ship. was what eventually sunk BFG as well.
 
Meh. I always liked XFX and honestly I think the reaction by Nvidia was a little over dramatic and bullshit to be honest. Now MSI, Asus, and Gigabyte play both sides so [insert jerk off motion here]. Since losing the rights to manufacture Nvidia cards they've fallen from the limelight they once had. Regrets? Probably, but Nvidia was always a little douchy like that and they still are with controlling how partners sell their cards.

I don't know about EVGA way back then, but I'm pretty sure just about every Nvidia partner was second fiddle to BFG. Two companies I actually miss on the Nvidia side, but EVGA's done a good job picking up the slack. I actually wont buy anything else after having the greatest experience with EVGA's RMA process.
 
I think XFX made the right move, quite frankly they are one of the best companies to deal with RMA wise. In the last 2 years I've bought several of their cards (7970 DDs, a 280x DD, and 2 290 DDs) and when I got them they were all the best price/performance cards to get at the time.

Hopefully XFX gets rewarded with an amazing 390x video card from AMD to sell. I will be one of the first in line to get one.
 
Vittra said:
XFX wouldn't exist today if they had remained with Nvidia.
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Agreed. Ask BFG if they regret not have jumped the ship. Every AIB got squeezed at times, a 3rd place in red team is better than a 10th place in green team, even if green gets 75% of the market.
 
I have never owned a XFX card before because I can get about the same card cheaper from HIS or Sapphire.. if XFX wants to sell me a card then my advice would be to design out side the box like Powercolor does with there higher end stuff as to be different .
 
fanboy said:
I have never owned a XFX card before because I can get about the same card cheaper from HIS or Sapphire.. if XFX wants to sell me a card then my advice would be to design out side the box like Powercolor does with there higher end stuff as to be different .
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They make pretty nice cards. I actually haven't had one since the NV days (Had a GTX 295 from them) but it was a great card, and they had really nice customer service / warranty.
 
fanboy said:
.. if XFX wants to sell me a card then my advice would be to design out side the box like Powercolor does with there higher end stuff as to be different .
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Forwarding this quote to my technical marketing manager.

And making it a personal quest to see you buy an XFX card in the next 12 months. :D
 
I've purchased an XFX 6870 and 7870 for my brother, and I have an XFX 290 DD in my 2nd PC. (I went with Sapphire for my R9 290Xs because that was all I could find in stock, and they were all reference anyways).

XFX makes good products and I prefer using them for other people's builds so that if a card dies, they don't have to deal with Sapphire or HIS for warranty purposes. I used to be a little off put by the "cheaper" reference designs they would release after the initial launch, but the DD cards are great.

XFXSupport, since I know you are reading this, I too would like to see you guys release a "higher end" product than the DD. The DD cooler on the 290 series was pretty good but still lacked good VRM cooling and wasn't as strong as the triple fan offerings from Sapphire or PowerColor. My 2 cents :)
 
Rizen said:
I've purchased an XFX 6870 and 7870 for my brother, and I have an XFX 290 DD in my 2nd PC. (I went with Sapphire for my R9 290Xs because that was all I could find in stock, and they were all reference anyways).

XFX makes good products and I prefer using them for other people's builds so that if a card dies, they don't have to deal with Sapphire or HIS for warranty purposes. I used to be a little off put by the "cheaper" reference designs they would release after the initial launch, but the DD cards are great.

XFXSupport, since I know you are reading this, I too would like to see you guys release a "higher end" product than the DD. The DD cooler on the 290 series was pretty good but still lacked good VRM cooling and wasn't as strong as the triple fan offerings from Sapphire or PowerColor. My 2 cents :)
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Pretty much. They could be great, but they miss the mark, its sad really, this card of mine is working fine, even though the VRM's are hotter than hell most of the time. If they would only invest whatever it costs to fix the thought process behind their coolers, they would be better than most on team red, by far.
 
griff30 said:
Once the 390X beats TitanX , you will see XFX licking the sweet, sweet tears of NVidia.


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Well to be honest that sounds a littlebit to optimistic. If that would be the case i think that the time window to enjoy that will be way shorter than the painfull time window where AMD was and still is behind and had/has to accept a significant shrink in market share. Nvidia now had so many months and years to cash in. AMD really needs a success but to be hones it is not very likely that even if AMD has success, that it will last very long. The company is bleeding money and invests significantly less R&D than Nvidia while having to keep up in the CPU segment against Intel as well.
 
Depends on who you ask.

For me, personally, I would rather drop a few more dollars and get a 980. The 8GB seems to be a wash on that card as it looks like it runs out of steam before it can make use of it's memory. With no concrete proof to the contrary, a respin on old tech is not for me.

I recall one major problem I had with my 290 cards. Every time I started up WMC or WMP to play back videos, the damn thing would run at full bore. I had to make custom profiles within Catalyst just to keep the temperatures manageable while doing something as simple as watching TV. I am hoping that since the 300 series is not for me that perhaps the Fury line is.

I would really like to replace some of these older cards I have in use. :(

[edit]
If you want to believe this guy, a 390X is on par with the cheaper 970 (on 3DMark anyway).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6kEcbLRnbVI
 
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When NV rebranded, they atleast moved a card down a tier even if the respin had higher performance. E.g gtx 680 -> gtx 770.

Looking at all the people here, there is alot of people being tricked thinking this cards is going to have a big chip and new silicon inside that competes with the gtx 980 ti.

Just imagine all the people that goes into store thinking they are getting something better than they are actually getting. That bestbuy video from AMD shows this will actually occur.

Why this deception is more likely to occur on top of the naming itself is the scheduling too. It will have been 20 months since the launch of the 290x. For that long of a period of time, one can expect something new from something called the 390x. This trickery is on a higher level as even the people here, which are normally more savvy still think this is the fiji chip.

The 20 month span is more likely to cause more rebuyers, i.e 290x to 390x upgraders.
 
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