Satisfied with pricings?

D

Dayvon

Weaksauce
Joined
Oct 6, 2004
Messages
117
With all the hoopla over the amazing 8800GTX, I think we've all been amazed and thinking, "Dang I wish I had one!" But then we look at the price....

$649.... $649!!!! Are you kidding me?

Don't get me wrong and hear me out for a second. I realize that yes, the card does have more transitors than a Core2Duo, and yes it does have 768MB of RAM. But seriously, its just a video card. The fastest yes, but that doesn't necessarily justify the price. And just because some people can afford it at $649 doesn't mean that it's a great price.

Let's take just a brief moment to look at top-end GPU prices over the past few years.

9700pro - http://hardocp.com/article.html?art=MzI3LDUsLGhlbnRodXNpYXN0 - $399 - July 2002

FX5800 - http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NDIxLDYsLGhlbnRodXNpYXN0

9800pro - http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NDM5LDEzLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==

9800XT - http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NTI5LDEsLGhuZXdz - $499 October 2003

6800Ultra - http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjA2LDksLDcw - $499 April 2004

X800XT - http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjExLDEwLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==

X850XT - http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NzI2LDEyLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA== - $499 March 2005

7800GTX - http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=Nzg0LDIwLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA== - $599 June 2005

X1800XT - http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=ODc1LDEzLCxoY29uc3VtZXI=

8800GTX - http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTIxOCwyLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA== - $649 November 2006


So in the span of 2002-2006, the top of the line cards have increased $250!! I guess this begs the question, what is the cause? Is it that games are too demanding for the available technology? Are we being price gouged? Are Nvidia and ATI trying to one-up each other to death? Is the market truly starting to seperate into more distinct groups... high-end gaming vs. mass-market gaming? We can see the PS3 and Wii defining that same problem.

I contend that $499 should be the price for the 8800GTX and $399 for the 8800GTS. Those are mass-market prices where are $649 is not. At the current prices, these cards are pretty much too high-end for most gamers. Who cares that the 8800GTX beats the X1950XTX, when it also costs about $250 more, and you can't get it because it is so expensive.

I guess the reason I bring this up is because with the soaring prices of some hardware, it makes having "great" gear twice as much $$$$. And in my mind, something needs to give.
 
Well there is inflation and the fact that currency isn't worth the same thing year to year. But yes high end hardware is getting expensive but no one is getting forced to buy anything. If you can afford it and see value in paying that much for technology then I don't see the problem. There are always midrange products for people that don't want to spend as much money and at quite reasonable prices with decent performance.
 
There are numerous people paying the high price for the 8800gtx, and still many a choice for those not looking to reach that deep into their pockets. Of course it would be nicer if the GTX was cheaper, but that's not the case and it's easily accepted so.
 
I agree with you. I dont understand why people jump at the first hint of something new and pay way too much. Thats why companies get away with this crap.
Anyone read the the new maximum pc.........
Vista is only going to allow 2 upgrade's......
Blue ray 1000 bucks.......
Complete BS!
Sorry for the rant.
 
you know, they mkae 8600gts for people just like yourself



this also includes me as i have no 600 dollars to spend :(
 
If this rate goes on, the companies need to adjust their marketing. Their cards are no longer targetted for gamers but professional gamers. Couple years go and high end card will brake the 800$ line easily.
 
I think the bottom line is that the cards listed are all flagship products that make up a very, very small percentage of sales. Those buying are one of two types: people with a ton of cash and equate the most expensive to the best; and the enthusiast. Either way, I think the couple of sales they may loose due to the $650 price point will be offset by the number itself.

These prices were not just dreamed up... They had to have done some research to figure out what the maximum price point could be to maximize profit.
 
Kinda getting tired of hearing people whine about this, seems like a flood of people complaining about price since the 8800 released.. it's simple, don't buy it.. buy a previous generation card for a few hundred less or wait until it drops in price.. there are plenty of people who can easily afford the gtx, if you can't it's not like you don't have other options..
 
Video cards are becoming more like processors. You pay $1000 for a bleeding edge CPU with maybe 10% performance over the $500 model. Now you can pay $650 over $500 for a 8800 GTX vs a 8800 GTS and get basically a higher level of AF and AA.

But generally nvidia cards have had good sales going within a month. I'm hoping the GTS price comes down to the $400 range by Dec.
 
These are high end cards. A high price comes with them. People pay these prices, including me. What types of people pay these prices? Kids who whine enough to get their parents to pay, or adults who actually have a job so they can easily afford something like this. If you can't afford it, you don't buy it and settle for something less.

Senario:
A kid goes to buy a Ferrari because he wants to have the coolest car out of all his friends.

Reality:
Either the kid is a spoiled faggot and his parents are rich and will buy it after he kicks and screams on the floor..

or..

Ferrari's are made for people who can afford them because they know how to make money for a living. They buy for status symbol, and for sheer driving excitement.

and..

The 8800GTX is the same case. Only someone who games at high resolution with max eye candy should 'need' one or have one. For lower resolution under 1600x1200, there are plenty of cards out there at good prices so you can play all the current games with no trouble.
 
Keep in mind, a lot of it has to do with the currency value. Here in Canada, I paid $600 + tax in September 2002 for my ATI 9700pro. Back then it would take over $1.50 CDN to equal $1.00 US. The 8800GTX can be found as low as $720 up here right now, but that's also because it now only takes $1.13 CDN to equal $1.00 US.

So that's $120 increase in 4 years. Not too bad.
 
w1retap said:
These are high end cards. A high price comes with them. People pay these prices, including me. What types of people pay these prices? Kids who whine enough to get their parents to pay, or adults who actually have a job so they can easily afford something like this. If you can't afford it, you don't buy it and settle for something less.

Senario:
A kid goes to buy a Ferrari because he wants to have the coolest car out of all his friends.

Reality:
Either the kid is a spoiled faggot and his parents are rich and will buy it after he kicks and screams on the floor..

or..

Ferrari's are made for people who can afford them because they know how to make money for a living. They buy for status symbol, and for sheer driving excitement.

and..

The 8800GTX is the same case. Only someone who games at high resolution with max eye candy should 'need' one or have one. For lower resolution under 1600x1200, there are plenty of cards out there at good prices so you can play all the current games with no trouble.
Click to expand...
This is exatly what I'm talking about though. Take a few years back, the top end cards were made and priced for the gamer. And there were cheaper products for casual gamers. Now, we have cards for casual gamers ($100), cards for gamers ($200-300), and cards for upper-end ($450+). I'm just commenting that the market is segmenting big with these cards. Regular average Joe gamer can't come near spending that much, for either the GTX or GTS. With these past generations, you had 7900GTX for the enthusiast, and 7900GTs at a price the average gamer could afford. Now we have the 8800GTS for the enthusiast and the 8800GTX for people with money to blow. The second tier card is not priced for the average gamer.

This is where I see that it just seems poorly priced. When the 7800GTX came out everyone wanted one, and enthusiasts bought it. But gamers bought the 7800GT because it gave them what they are looking for at a price they could afford. The 7800GTX performance drove the sales of the 7800GT for average Joe.

But here, the 8800GTX is not going to spur sales for the GTS, because the prices is just too high. An average joe can't afford a $500 card. A $300-$400 card yes, but not a $500. Not only does he have to fight through the WAF (wife-approval-factor), but he also actually has to have half-a-grand to blow. The rising prices of the best cards make them out of reach for the vast majority of gamers, where as in past generations it hasn't been this way.

EDIT: holy crap!! I just noticed your sig with the Westy 1080p monitor. I almost bought one of those, but I knew I wouldn't be able to game at those resolutions with my budget, so I bought the 32" 1366x768 Westy. I've been happy with it. But damn, i luv those Westy 1080p's.
 
Also note that the 9700 Pro was very cheap for a new architecture at the time. The GeForce 4 was also quite cheap. The GF 3, on the other hand, was $600 and the GF2 Ultra was also quite expensive, especially considering that it was not the first flavor of GF2 to launch, the lower-tiered GTS was.

There is an upward trend in pricing, but it's not as dramatic as the opening post makes it out to be. I would also say that as computer gaming has become bigger, there is more room for an ultra high-end market, and that's why we're seeing more expensive flavors of GPU's than 4 years ago, when there was no XT or XTX, just the 9700 vanilla and Pro. It also stated in the HardOCP review that it cost nVidia 4 years and almost $500 million to develop this thing. Since the high end doesn't sell nearly as many units as the midrange, the price needs to be high to make it worth their while.

Basically, I don't see any merit to the price whining. An 8800 GTS is an amazing card, probably better than any other new card was for its time except the GeForce 256 and Radeon 9700 Pro. The fact that the market can now support an even more amazing GTX model is just icing on the cake, but nobody's forcing you to buy one. I have no sympathy for anyone who is upset because they can't afford the best of the best even though what they can afford is better than it ever was.
 
well now a top of the line MB is pushing $300 a top end quad core $1300 super-uber-duper overclocking/gamming ram $600 , oh i forgot you must have some type of gold plate case and watercooling --i would guess another $400 and you must have a gold-plated 1000w PSU to power all this overpriced junk and add another $100 a month to the light bill-- say about $300 for the psu--and you need a huge widescreen display too and in a overpriced copy of vista and a quad of raptors and a overpriced-sound card--and speakers-- now add a $600+ video card--$$$$LOL

underneath all the hype it's really all about $$$ and this computer stuff has a value life of a loaf of bread . are we getting gouged?--no question . have we been gouged before--?? allways. whats diffrent than before --were being gouged more and on every part of the system and at the same time we are getting a sizeable advance-- a larger advance in technology due to the generational jump . IS IT WORTH IT ? maybe --maybe not . although we being gouged again--there is at least a sizeable jump THIS TIME .

if you allready have a huge display and a powerful computer--and all you need is a 8800 to top it off then maybe . if you were thinking of going sli or crossfire--but haven't spent the $$$ yet--then maybe--

but if your me--running a couple of 22 inch and 19 inch displays. playing games that came out in 2004. and have other things up on the upgrade list ahead of the videocard-- i would say no . is the price too high ? yes--but it allways is too high .

maybe i'll pick up a couple of 7950x2's on the cheap ? i can sit on my wallet for a long time if i have enough gpu--and having enough gpu is getting easyer all the time. :cool:
 
Also factor in that the cards are made in Taiwan and the exchange rate for US$ has tanked big style over the last few years. That makes them more expensive.

They've gone up in the UK too, but not that much to be honest, GTS is on a price parity -+10% with what I paid for my 9700 Pro when it came out as far as I can remember.
 
OP - interesting thing I noticed about your thread and the video card prices is that generally if you buy top of the line video card when it's first released (~$500) it will last you at most 2.5 years before it is totally obsolete. So i'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing.
 
JSF35rhino said:
well now a top of the line MB is pushing $300 a top end quad core $1300 super-uber-duper overclocking/gamming ram $600 , oh i forgot you must have some type of gold plate case and watercooling --i would guess another $400 and you must have a gold-plated 1000w PSU to power all this overpriced junk and add another $100 a month to the light bill-- say about $300 for the psu--and you need a huge widescreen display too and in a overpriced copy of vista and a quad of raptors and a overpriced-sound card--and speakers-- now add a $600+ video card--$$$$LOL
Click to expand...
And yet I can build a brand new system with an 8800 GTS for $1,250 that can play new games at high settings for 12-18 months. That's never been possible before. You act like the fact that there are higher-end options that didn't exist before is the same as these companies putting a gun to your head and forcing you to buy them. You can pick up gear for the same or lower prices as the old stuff when it first came out that is just as good a deal in terms of performance compared to games available. The fact that it's now possible to spend $4,000 or more for that extra mile of performance does not mean that prices have gone up, it just means that the market is able to support a new ultra high-end segment that didn't exist before. Well, technically there's always been an ultra high-end segment with people buying SCSI drives and such, but it's never merited its own consumer products before.

The point is that a new computer today with an 8800 GTS can run today's games better than a 2002 computer with a 9700 Pro could run 2002's games and do it for the same amount of money.
 
they price it that way so that the Jones' can pay for the initial R&D and what-not.
 
tims880 said:
I agree with you. I dont understand why people jump at the first hint of something new and pay way too much. Thats why companies get away with this crap.
Anyone read the the new maximum pc.........
Vista is only going to allow 2 upgrade's......
Blue ray 1000 bucks.......
Complete BS!
Sorry for the rant.
Click to expand...

Lemme make things a little better for you: Vista will not be limited to 2 upgrades (according to anandtech). Seems like they got the message:)

As for the video card prices, well, what can you do?
 
They raised the prices because they expected our deadbeat asses to get a raise by now. A different story for us that don't have jobs :D
 
What do you mean by "vista is only going to allow 2 uprades"? What does that mean?
 
Hulk said:
What do you mean by "vista is only going to allow 2 uprades"? What does that mean?
Click to expand...

I think he's referring to operating system transfers.
 
WS6 said:
they price it that way so that the Jones' can pay for the initial R&D and what-not.
Click to expand...

Exactly, the G80 took 4 years and 475million in R&D to create.

Thats almost half a billion dollars!!!

But what the real problem is that no matter what the G80's were priced at, you would still bitch about something.

Blu-ray is too expensive, gas prices are too high, blah blah fuckin blah....

If you can't afford or don't want to pay the high prices, buy last gen's technology.
 
it is simple supply and demand (and i know, everyone says it, its cliche")

But honestly, if people are going to buy it at that price, they will sell it at that price, then they will lower it, and they will get even more money, because you think $500 is an excellent price, and the high end gamers will buy it.

WE ARE THE PROBLEM, the people on this site and many others that buy a $650 video card. We are the people who buy at that price, why not raise it when it is shown that people will in fact buy it.
 
And to think we're considered hedonistic SOB's more interested in
self-gratification than charitable generosity in the eyes of others.

What were they thinking?
 
arcturus said:
And to think we're considered hedonistic SOB's more interested in
self-gratification than charitable generosity in the eyes of others.

What were they thinking?
Click to expand...

And that stereotype is dead on. Being one of the hedonistic SOBs myself, I'd rather pick up a PS3 for 600 than a card for 649. I get more for my money with the PS3.
 
Am I the only one that remembers 8088-2 8MHz machines with 640K RAM, a 5-1/4 inch floppy, 32 meg RLL drives, and CGA graphics that only displayed 16 colors at a time costing well over $2000 without monitor or keyboard, and that not even being the top-of-the-line? These days, I can build a machine that'll rape most other gaming machines for much less than that. $650 for a high end video card is more than I can afford, but it's not a shocking price to me. Besides... Overall, the percentage of people buying 8800GTXs versus the rest of the 8 series cards is going to be small. It's a flagship product to push technology further. That further pushed tech trickles down into cards such as the future 8600GT, which will cost much less and still perform admirably.
 
Well, the top end has gotten more expensive, yeah. But CPU's have partially gotten cheaper (an A64 3000+ for $60 is an acceptable gaming CPU), sound is more integrated, and other stuff hasn't increased in price much.

Performance gains have been huge, doubling and redoubling over the course of months. An 8600 gt will be light years beyond a 9700 pro, and it'll be a fair price.
 
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