What exactly is the deal with GPUs

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At the end of the day it's simply demand exceeding supply. Whatever the factors are, more people want to buy what is currently available for sale. That's about it.
True enough. But that doesn't excuse the utter chaos in the marketplace. If Nvidia or AMD wants to earn some customer loyalty, they should take a more direct role in the equitable distribution of available inventory. Of course, that begs the issue of what is "equitable," so I'll just say that everyone who wants a card has an equal chance of getting one, in some sort of time-based order. And that means, screw the scalpers and the miners.
 
No they can’t. They’re not allowed to dictate distributor sell prices. BestBuy could sell them for $10,000 per card if they felt like it, and the only thing Nvidia can really do to respond is restrict MDF funds or try to keep them in check by selling Founders Edition cards at MSRP on their own website.
Yes they can, due to their branding as well they can set a ceiling on max price, ASUS, MSI, EVGA etc. are partners with Nvidia for manufacturing Nvidia branded cards, except Nvidia is not restricting the max price as far as I can see. Nvidia can if they wanted to in other words, tell the AIB -> no more chips if your price is too high. If Nvidia is dealing with dealers/retailers, they can cut off supply, same as for the AIBs to whom do not follow the pricing set by them. I do not see this happening. As for scalpers etc. no control over that. From link above:
If a manufacturer, on its own, adopts a policy regarding a desired level of prices, the law allows the manufacturer to deal only with retailers who agree to that policy. A manufacturer also may stop dealing with a retailer that does not follow its resale price policy. That is, a manufacturer can implement a dealer policy on a "take it or leave it" basis.

So doing some more guess work; partners/AIBs are buying available higher priced binned chips driving up the overall cost to the card which would give Nvidia more profits. Binned chips are specialty categorized allotments that probably can be sold as high as someone is willing to pay for them. I could be 100% wrong so take this with some lemonade but do see a out for both Nvidia and AIBs to sell cards way above the MSRP which in the end is only a suggestion for the price.

For example, BestBuy normally only sells at MSRP or less, the PNY GeForce RTX 3090 24GB XLR8 Gaming EPIC-X RGB Triple Fan Graphics Card is priced at $2149.99. Not even a liquid cooled card! lol
 
Yes they can, due to their branding as well they can set a ceiling on max price, ASUS, MSI, EVGA etc. are partners with Nvidia for manufacturing Nvidia branded cards, except Nvidia is not restricting the max price as far as I can see. Nvidia can if they wanted to in other words, tell the AIB -> no more chips if your price is too high. If Nvidia is dealing with dealers/retailers, they can cut off supply, same as for the AIBs to whom do not follow the pricing set by them. I do not see this happening. As for scalpers etc. no control over that. From link above:


So doing some more guess work; partners/AIBs are buying available higher priced binned chips driving up the overall cost to the card which would give Nvidia more profits. Binned chips are specialty categorized allotments that probably can be sold as high as someone is willing to pay for them. I could be 100% wrong so take this with some lemonade but do see a out for both Nvidia and AIBs to sell cards way above the MSRP which in the end is only a suggestion for the price.

For example, BestBuy normally only sells at MSRP or less, the PNY GeForce RTX 3090 24GB XLR8 Gaming EPIC-X RGB Triple Fan Graphics Card is priced at $2149.99. Not even a liquid cooled card! lol

Oh, ok, I see what you’re trying to say now. Of course they’re free to walk away from a distributor relationship, but that’s not the same thing as being able to dictate the price that a distributor sells at. The manufacturer must allow the distributor to come to this price independently. From your link (emphasis mine):

Q: One of my suppliers marks its products with a Manufacturer Suggested Retail Price (MSRP). Do I have to charge this price?

A: The key word is "suggested." A dealer is free to set the retail price of the products it sells. A dealer can set the price at the MSRP or at a different price, as long as the dealer comes to that decision on its own. However, the manufacturer can decide not to use distributors that do not adhere to its MSRP.

Q: I am a manufacturer and I occasionally get complaints from dealers about the retail prices that other dealers are charging for my products. What should I tell them?

A: Competitors at each level of the supply chain must set prices independently. That means manufacturers cannot agree on wholesale prices, and dealers cannot agree on retail prices. However, a manufacturer can listen to its dealers and take action on its own in response to what it learns from them.

My pushback is I had interpreted what you were saying as Nvidia can set the resale price of their distributors. They can’t do that, but yes, they do have tools to try to force companies to play ball. One is cutting them off, but barring that, MDF funds or offering Founders Edition cards can pull prices in line with what they want to do. Prices at the retail level have to be set independently from the manufacturer though. This is why, for example, socks at a “fine fashion retailer” might cost more than the same socks at Walmart. They know their customer picking up their $2000 suit will pay more for the convenience (and not having to admit to their yacht club buddies that they’re wearing Walmart socks), so they charge more.

The question is, does Nvidia think it’s worthwhile to apply pricing pressure in the current market? Given demand, complete lack of supply at the raw materials level, and the fact that major channel partners are facilitating secondary market sales now anyway (Best Buy, Amazon, Newegg, etc), I would say probably not, so that’s fair to argue, but also, from Nvidia’s standpoint, it doesn’t make a whole lot of business sense. They’re going to sell every card they can make, and their primary competitor is also supply constrained and doesn’t have the same level of brand perception. There’s really no point in irritating your channel partners by pressuring them to lower their prices when it doesn’t change the outcome.
 
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Oh, ok, I see what you’re trying to say now. Of course they’re free to walk away from a distributor relationship, but that’s not the same thing as being able to dictate the price that a distributor sells at. The manufacturer must allow the distributor to come to this price independently. From your link (emphasis mine):



My pushback is I had interpreted what you were saying as Nvidia can set the resale price of their distributors. They can’t do that, but yes, they do have tools to try to force companies to play ball. One is cutting them off, but barring that, MDF funds or offering Founders Edition cards can pull prices in line with what they want to do. Prices at the retail level have to be set independently from the manufacturer though. This is why, for example, socks at a “fine fashion retailer” might cost more than the same socks at Walmart. They know their customer picking up their $2000 suit will pay more for the convenience (and not having to admit to their yacht club buddies that they’re wearing Walmart socks), so they charge more.

The question is, does Nvidia think it’s worthwhile to apply pricing pressure in the current market? Given demand, complete lack of supply at the raw materials level, and the fact that major channel partners are facilitating secondary market sales now anyway (Best Buy, Amazon, Newegg, etc), I would say probably not, so that’s fair to argue, but also, from Nvidia’s standpoint, it doesn’t make a whole lot of business sense. They’re going to sell every card they can make, and their primary competitor is also supply constrained and doesn’t have the same level of brand perception. There’s really no point in irritating your channel partners by pressuring them to lower their prices when it doesn’t change the outcome.
The upcoming Nvidia financial maybe revealing or will hint at what is going on. If Nvidia is making astounding better profit margins it would hint at one thing, if their profits increase overall also another. Unless one has spys or leakers (who motive would always be questionable) or work for Nvidia directly, not sure any of us can come to any sort of concrete truth in the matter. Best explanation may just be as mentioned before, shortages leads to higher prices and nothing more to see here.
 
its too bad you can't just pre-order one somewhere and wait in line as stock shows up they process the queue until you end up with a card or cancel because stock is everywhere.
A queue system sounds good except that does not make more cards. Those who hit up on the list early may not have to wait long, where 2 hours later could mean months of waiting and will be no chance of obtaining a card other then from a reseller, scalper etc. Just ask the folks who have been waiting months for EVGA list. Luckily EVGA also release cards like through BestBuy which I was able to pick up an EVGA 3090 from while some are still waiting for theirs.
 
The upcoming Nvidia financial maybe revealing or will hint at what is going on. If Nvidia is making astounding better profit margins it would hint at one thing, if their profits increase overall also another. Unless one has spys or leakers (who motive would always be questionable) or work for Nvidia directly, not sure any of us can come to any sort of concrete truth in the matter. Best explanation may just be as mentioned before, shortages leads to higher prices and nothing more to see here.

As far as I know, their silicon price to board partners remains the same, and those board partners are selling into the retail chain notwithstanding the Founders Edition, so you won’t see anything for that. The only change in margins you will see will be at the retail level, or possibly with the board partners, although the latter typically makes more by just launching a higher end sku rather than changing the price to distributor.
 
If Nvidia or AMD wants to earn some customer loyalty, they should take a more direct role in the equitable distribution of available inventory.

This take makes no sense. It's literally a duopoly in the gaming graphics space. There is no reason for customer loyalty to drive any of their business decisions right now. Where else are you going to go? Consoles? Wow AMD makes the chips for those too.
 
This take makes no sense. It's literally a duopoly in the gaming graphics space. There is no reason for customer loyalty to drive any of their business decisions right now. Where else are you going to go? Consoles? Wow AMD makes the chips for those too.

In the future, it might mean loyalty to buying high-end cards because it's fun to have powerful computer hardware versus buying mid or low-end cards because you want to game, but every company is a villainous rat.

Or worse. You might just decide you don't want to deal with any of these companies, so you go buy a kite or marble set, or whatever else people did to have fun before computers.
 
In the future, it might mean loyalty to buying high-end cards because it's fun to have powerful computer hardware versus buying mid or low-end cards because you want to game, but every company is a villainous rat.

Or worse. You might just decide you don't want to deal with any of these companies, so you go buy a kite or marble set, or whatever else people did to have fun before computers.

Somehow... I think they'll live.
 
This take makes no sense. It's literally a duopoly in the gaming graphics space. There is no reason for customer loyalty to drive any of their business decisions right now. Where else are you going to go? Consoles? Wow AMD makes the chips for those too.
Well, let's say that AMD did implement a rational wait-list system but NVidia did not. At some point, more people are going to buy AMD. Or if Nvidia wanted to totally crush AMD, they could implement this system but AMD did not.

The current situation provides an opening for Intel they could drive through with an 18-wheeler, IF they are serious about the GPU market.
 
True enough. But that doesn't excuse the utter chaos in the marketplace. If Nvidia or AMD wants to earn some customer loyalty, they should take a more direct role in the equitable distribution of available inventory. Of course, that begs the issue of what is "equitable," so I'll just say that everyone who wants a card has an equal chance of getting one, in some sort of time-based order. And that means, screw the scalpers and the miners.
How many cards are nvidia and AMD directly selling to consumers? Are they supposed to enforce this "equitable" system on all of their distributors and renegotiate all of their contracts accordingly for a temporary crisis? And how would this system help one company sell more cards than the other? They're all going to be 100% sold-out pretty much regardless regardless of what they do, so a price hike is one of the few things that makes sense to me. Also, have you seen Intel's situation lately? They're losing on the CPU front to AMD, Apple, and Amazon of all people and their integrated GPUs have always been mediocre, where are they suddenly going to get the budget from to invest seriously into GPU design in order to solve the problems of a temporary crisis that will be gone by the time their GPUs would hit shelves?

Also, as far as the nvidia side goes, none of this is going to change the fact that owning a a 3xxx series card right now is like having a money printer (ETH pricing is at all time highs and the cards are very efficient miners). No matter how many money printers you create, people are going to want more. And those people using GPUs to earn money are going to have a financial incentive to use bots, buy other people's spots in line, etc., because they're earning a return on their investment and a gamer isn't. In my world, that means they'll be much more motivated to get these cards than the average consumer and most average consumers are still going to miss out.

For what it's worth though, the store microcenter near me had about 20 AMD cards on its shelves in the middle of the afternoon last week which was a good sign. They were also priced about 30% higher than a few months ago.
 
Well, let's say that AMD did implement a rational wait-list system but NVidia did not. At some point, more people are going to buy AMD. Or if Nvidia wanted to totally crush AMD, they could implement this system but AMD did not.

The current situation provides an opening for Intel they could drive through with an 18-wheeler, IF they are serious about the GPU market.
This sort of assumes both companies are both selling all the card directly vs having AIB partners.
 
This sort of assumes both companies are both selling all the card directly vs having AIB partners.
Both companies have enough power over their AIB partners to create such a program. It's a matter of corporate policy and will for N and A.
 
So, scalping is "equitable"? News to me...
Scalping is correcting a market inefficiency. When something is sold below it's actual value / supply is too low to meet demand, there's going to be people reselling it for a higher price. Because AMD and nVidia underpriced their GPUs given the current demand they created a situation where this was possible. Now instead of the people at AMD and nVidia earning the extra profit, the people that took a risk in reselling inventory and capitalizing on that failure are making that profit.

I've mentioned elsewhere, but 3xxx series cards are money printers right now for ETH mining. You can make about $10/day per 3080, and if bought at MSRP, pay off your initial investment in a couple of months and still have a card worth over 100% of what you paid for it. Who wouldn't jump on that? Added to that, there is unprecedented demand from all types of consumers as well as supply issues caused by a multiple of factors and that's why there's such a large gap between what the cards are sold at and what they're worth to people, leading to an opportunity for resellers to fill that gap and provide cards at the prices people are willing to pay.

To answer your point about being equitable, do you mean everyone should have an equal outcome? That sounds pretty unfair to me and like a pretty terrible idea. If someone is willing to pay double MSRP for a card that is unavailable for MSRP because they need it for something more important to them than what you consider important for your use case, I think it's pretty fair that they're able to offer more money than you in order to secure their card and in a way, signal that their need is greater than yours. Setting price controls on these cards is only going to lead to people with the greater need losing out to people with the lesser need, which isn't good either (if we want to operate efficiently, some guy that uses 3 x 3090s for work and is willing to pay $2000 for each for card should be able to offer that amount for an increased chance to buy them versus three people that only want them for occasional gaming and are only willing to spend MSRP).
 
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Scalping is correcting a market inefficiency. When something is sold below it's actual value / supply is too low to meet demand, there's going to be people reselling it for a higher price. Because AMD and nVidia underpriced their GPUs given the current demand they created a situation where this was possible. Now instead of the people at AMD and nVidia earning the extra profit, the people that took a risk in reselling inventory and capitalizing on that failure are making that profit.

I've mentioned elsewhere, but 3xxx series cards are money printers right now for ETH mining. You can make about $10/day per 3080, and if bought at MSRP, pay off your initial investment in a couple of months and still have a card worth over 100% of what you paid for it. Who wouldn't jump on that? Added to that, there is unprecedented demand from all types of consumers as well as supply issues caused by a multiple of factors and that's why there's such a large gap between what the cards are sold at and what they're worth to people, leading to an opportunity for resellers to fill that gap and provide cards at the prices people are willing to pay.

To answer your point about being equitable, do you mean everyone should have an equal outcome? That sounds pretty unfair to me and like a pretty terrible idea. If someone is willing to pay double MSRP for a card that is unavailable for MSRP because they need it for something more important to them than what you consider important for your use case, I think it's pretty fair that they're able to offer more money than you in order to secure their card and in a way, signal that their need is greater than yours. Setting price controls on these cards is only going to lead to people with the greater need losing out to people with the lesser need, which isn't good either (if we want to operate efficiently, some guy that uses 3 x 3090s for work and is willing to pay $2000 for each for card should be able to offer that amount for an increased chance to buy them versus three people that only want them for occasional gaming and are only willing to spend MSRP).
People are cheating the system with bots and taking advantage of other people without the knowledge.
The result is people who want and need the components that cant afford them.
I think the original price of video cards is plenty high.
Im sure the Mfgs. would make more if they could to get the money instead of scalpers profiting from their shortcomings.

Im speaking as a person who is priced out of the market and stuck using a 4-5yr old card that was lower-midrange at that time/
 
Scalping is correcting a market inefficiency. When something is sold below it's actual value / supply is too low to meet demand, there's going to be people reselling it for a higher price. Because AMD and nVidia underpriced their GPUs given the current demand they created a situation where this was possible. Now instead of the people at AMD and nVidia earning the extra profit, the people that took a risk in reselling inventory and capitalizing on that failure are making that profit.

I've mentioned elsewhere, but 3xxx series cards are money printers right now for ETH mining. You can make about $10/day per 3080, and if bought at MSRP, pay off your initial investment in a couple of months and still have a card worth over 100% of what you paid for it. Who wouldn't jump on that? Added to that, there is unprecedented demand from all types of consumers as well as supply issues caused by a multiple of factors and that's why there's such a large gap between what the cards are sold at and what they're worth to people, leading to an opportunity for resellers to fill that gap and provide cards at the prices people are willing to pay.

To answer your point about being equitable, do you mean everyone should have an equal outcome? That sounds pretty unfair to me and like a pretty terrible idea. If someone is willing to pay double MSRP for a card that is unavailable for MSRP because they need it for something more important to them than what you consider important for your use case, I think it's pretty fair that they're able to offer more money than you in order to secure their card and in a way, signal that their need is greater than yours. Setting price controls on these cards is only going to lead to people with the greater need losing out to people with the lesser need, which isn't good either (if we want to operate efficiently, some guy that uses 3 x 3090s for work and is willing to pay $2000 for each for card should be able to offer that amount for an increased chance to buy them versus three people that only want them for occasional gaming and are only willing to spend MSRP).
That... doesn't make a lick of sense. NVIDIA and AMD are making the same amount of profit regardless of who is purchasing their products. And everybody has an equal opportunity to buy from retailers. Scalpers are tipping the opportunity toward themselves as they use bot farms. So, no, there is no equality of opportunity or "correction" of that with scalpers gaming the system.
 
That... doesn't make a lick of sense. NVIDIA and AMD are making the same amount of profit regardless of who is purchasing their products. And everybody has an equal opportunity to buy from retailers. Scalpers are tipping the opportunity toward themselves as they use bot farms. So, no, there is no equality of opportunity or "correction" of that with scalpers gaming the system.
Ok, fine, go lobby your politicians to force fairness on the world. It totally won't lead to black markets selling the parts underground to the highest bidders.
 
That... doesn't make a lick of sense. NVIDIA and AMD are making the same amount of profit regardle
That... doesn't make a lick of sense. NVIDIA and AMD are making the same amount of profit regardless of who is purchasing their products. And everybody has an equal opportunity to buy from retailers. Scalpers are tipping the opportunity toward themselves as they use bot farms. So, no, there is no equality of opportunity or "correction" of that with scalpers gaming the system.
Only way to fight it is to get a bot army to buy and resell at the purchased price i guess.
 
Ok, fine, go lobby your politicians to force fairness on the world. It totally won't lead to black markets selling the parts underground to the highest bidders.
I never argued for price controls or regulation. I was just commenting how I disagree with your opinion. For the record, I am not against resellers of any product that is non-essential, but I am still going to criticize the practice of selling "new stock" at exorbitant prices.
 
crypto mining + fab issues + pandemic...the perfect storm...only hope is that the crypto market crashes otherwise we might be looking at 2022 before things improve...
 
I never argued for price controls or regulation. I was just commenting how I disagree with your opinion. For the record, I am not against resellers of any product that is non-essential, but I am still going to criticize the practice of selling "new stock" at exorbitant prices.
Im not even against people reselling them entirely. The greed to ask more than a finders fee and try to get rich by doubling or quadrupling the price is just evil when they are cheating to screw the market.
Send them all to brick and mortar stores and make us wait in line like its black Friday might even be better.
Bots cant stand in line yet.
 
I've mentioned elsewhere, but 3xxx series cards are money printers right now for ETH mining. You can make about $10/day per 3080, and if bought at MSRP, pay off your initial investment in a couple of months and still have a card worth over 100% of what you paid for it.
Does this actually factor in electricity costs and the fact that you will need to mine that card for 2 months (or whatever) straight?
 
You know what I find fuckin hilarious?

Nvidia has all this money, enough to gobble up whole companies and they can't figure out how to run a online store. That is funny. So they relegate the task to Best Buy, a store notorious for screwing up online orders or lackluster customer service in general. Its mind numbing.
I've honestly never had an issue with Best Buy. Bought tons of things from them (including an RTX 3080 FE) and they've been great.
 
Does this actually factor in electricity costs and the fact that you will need to mine that card for 2 months (or whatever) straight?

Yes. on my RX6800 I can do from $7-12 USD a day pending on how prices fluctuate, that takes into account my power at $0.08 CAD per KW
 
Im not even against people reselling them entirely. The greed to ask more than a finders fee and try to get rich by doubling or quadrupling the price is just evil when they are cheating to screw the market.
Send them all to brick and mortar stores and make us wait in line like its black Friday might even be better.
Bots cant stand in line yet.

you can't fault a person for trying to extract as much value as possible for an item...it's not like anyone is forcing people to buy the cards at those prices...people are making a choice to buy it...if a person can make $600+ profit on an item then more power to them...it's perfectly legal and sounds like good business...this is not like withholding food or needed medical supplies during a pandemic...GPU's are a luxury item...especially in a COVID landscape where tons of people lost their jobs or are struggling financially
 
crypto mining + fab issues + pandemic...the perfect storm...only hope is that the crypto market crashes otherwise we might be looking at 2022 before things improve...

+ polar vortex

It's worse that that. Without crypto, we can't afford the cards. It's a catch-22.

Even worse, it takes 512 GPUs running 24x7 for a year to buy a mid-tier GPU using crypto (and that's with the parents flipping the power bill).
 
Does this actually factor in electricity costs and the fact that you will need to mine that card for 2 months (or whatever) straight?
Yes. Electricity costs vary and you'd want to tweak the cards to run as efficiently as possible, but roughly speaking you'll make about $10/day per card currently with a 3080 mining ETH. So you'd pay off a $900 RTX 3080 in about 90 days, and a $700 MSRP card in about 70 days. Ethereum is at an all-time high price and nVidia's new cards just came out and they mine it very efficiently, so it's a double whammy in that regard.

As far as risks go, even if the Ethereum developers magically release their 2.0 code that destroys mining profits prior to your break even point, or something happens like the price of ETH collapses overnight, your GPU investment isn't going to suddenly be worth $0. That's why if you could get a 3080 at the store for a $700 MSRP there's low risk in losing your money and a high probability of making money. So if you're looking to use GPUs to make money the scenarios I see as most likely are:
1.) Re-sell immediately for $100-200 or something per card
2.) Mine until unprofitable, re-sell for around MSRP when unprofitable

Option #2 is where you have a little bit of risk. If mining becomes suddenly unprofitable then it's likely that everyone else will be dumping their cards on ebay and you won't get nearly the same price you would currently for these cards. The last time this happened there was a glut of cards available and their prices tanked. This time if it happens, there are additional other factors causing higher demand on the consumer side so the prices might not tank as much. So let's say that the price differential between these two sale options is $200 / card (what you'll get for selling now is an estimated $200 higher than what you'll get if you sell when the ETH mining situation collapses). In that case, as long as you think you can successfully mine with your card(s) for at least 20 days ($10/day estimated) then it makes more sense to keep them and mine with them. If you think the ETH mining market is going to collapse within 20 days, then it would make more sense to sell the cards immediately for the highest possible price.


There's other tax complications to this that make the situation even better for the miner though. As a re-seller on ebay you're eventually going to have to pay taxes for the sales you made. As a miner, you can form your own business and expense the depreciation costs of your equipment (capital depreciation like any other factory / capital investment) and you can also deduct the operating costs of electricity, etc. as well. Or you could go the illegal route and just exchange the ETH you mined for something like Monero, claim zero income, and not pay any taxes.

I hope this explains why these cards are in such high demand right now. If they were available in abundance and at MSRP, I could spend $20k on cards and earn $100k/year in passive income at current rates. That might only last 6 months to a year until ETH 2.0 comes out, or it might crash to $50k/year in passive income if the price of ETH crashes, but even in a scenario like that I'd still be able to re-sell the cards, recoup most of my investment, and claim the rest as a tax deductible expense to offset taxes on my earnings.
 
Im not even against people reselling them entirely. The greed to ask more than a finders fee and try to get rich by doubling or quadrupling the price is just evil when they are cheating to screw the market.
Send them all to brick and mortar stores and make us wait in line like its black Friday might even be better.
Agreed. Yet every time I suggest some form of "control", or punishment for this cheating the market, I'm accused of being some insane communist. I don't see what's wrong with castigating those cheating the system. In the absence of such a punishment, send the GPUs to physical stores where bots can't cheat consumers out of buying. I'll happily stand in line on BB a whole day if I actually have a chance of getting a GPU.
I've honestly never had an issue with Best Buy. Bought tons of things from them (including an RTX 3080 FE) and they've been great.
I've only managed to see the "add to cart" button one morning, failed miserably at getting one. Still, I'm hopeful. Perhaps this Friday? Fingers crossed.
 
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