GPU Availability and Pricing Update: Keep Watching…and Waiting

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Gordon_4

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Semi-related, but my grandfather's GPU died today. It was an old HD6970 that I bought new back in 2011. So first of, salute to that damn thing for putting up with our bullshit as much as it did. I'm deeply considering wall mounting it. On the less enthusiastic side all I had to replace with with was a HD4890, a card series that Windows 10 does not support outside a basic driver.

So now, my grandfather is in the uncomfortable position where he is going to need to drop either almost $400 on something like a 1050Ti that honest to God shouldn't be that much now, or a nicer sounding $149 on a card that has been described by some as 'manufactured e-waste'.

Fuck this shortage.
 
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Chimpzy

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Semi-related, but my grandfather's GPU died today. It was an old HD6970 that I bought new back in 2011. So first of, salute to that damn thing for putting up with our bullshit as much as it did. I'm deeply considering wall mounting it. On the less enthusiastic side all I had to replace with with was a HD4890, a card series that Windows 10 does not support outside a basic driver.

So now, my grandfather is in the uncomfortable position where he is going to need to drop either almost $400 on something like a 1050Ti that honest to God shouldn't be that much now, or a nicer sounding $149 on a card that has been described by some as 'manufactured e-waste'.

Fuck this shortage.
It's not much of a comfort, since there is still quite a ways to go, but now that crypto is dropping in the wake of China and other countries banning it, apparently so are GPU prices as a consequence of mining becoming less viable.

So let's hope more countries decide to kick in crypto-bro teeth.

EDIT: word through the grapevine is that Russia is also considering a ban on crypto. A big deal, since Russia has the biggest crypto mining presence. See above for why that might matter.
 
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It's not much of a comfort, since there is still quite a ways to go, but now that crypto is dropping in the wake of China and other countries banning it, apparently so are GPU prices as a consequence of mining becoming less viable.

So let's hope more countries decide to kick in crypto-bro teeth.

EDIT: word through the grapevine is that Russia is also considering a ban on crypto. A big deal, since Russia has the biggest crypto mining presence. See above for why that might matter.
Good. Crypto is patently a waste of energy and a pox on everyone who just wants gaming hardware for that "gaming" thing. Let's hope the miners flood the market with used cards and cause prices to crash so that scalpers end up financially ruined.
 

gorfias

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Semi-related, but my grandfather's GPU died today. It was an old HD6970 that I bought new back in 2011. So first of, salute to that damn thing for putting up with our bullshit as much as it did. I'm deeply considering wall mounting it. On the less enthusiastic side all I had to replace with with was a HD4890, a card series that Windows 10 does not support outside a basic driver.

So now, my grandfather is in the uncomfortable position where he is going to need to drop either almost $400 on something like a 1050Ti that honest to God shouldn't be that much now, or a nicer sounding $149 on a card that has been described by some as 'manufactured e-waste'.

Fuck this shortage.
I had that card in my 2012 build! Still working in 2018, I gave it to my nephew. Replaced it with a $240 RX 480 8 GB that, knock on wood, is still working well. Plays most new games at 60 FPS, 1080P. That is starting to change and my next monitor will require a lot more (4K TV, or actual 144 hz real PC monitor).

To think in early 2020 I bought a friend an RX 570 4 GB for $150.

I try to get 6 years from my builds. 2 to go on this one. If it dies and prices are still insane, I'll likely get something like this for now until things normalize, if ever.


That is an amazing price. I typically see them for more like $150 in these times, in which case I'd be out about $75 for a premium price rather than the normal $75ish. Better than spending $600 on a $150 card.

EDIT: Appears this is a thing now. Advised to ensure you are getting a DDR5 version.


You would think supply would be trying to catch up to demand. Instead I read about how 3 gen old 1050 TI, as you note, selling for as much as a 1070 cost a couple of years ago.
 

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Anthony of Linus Tech Tips breaking down nVidia's latest bit of vaporware, and AMD's.....peculiar entry in the budget graphics card space.

Mind you, that 6500XT would be an ideal replacement for my grandfather. He doesn't game, unless you count Spider Solitaire, but its new and has enough grunt to drive his single 4k display.
 

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Anthony of Linus Tech Tips breaking down nVidia's latest bit of vaporware, and AMD's.....peculiar entry in the budget graphics card space.

Mind you, that 6500XT would be an ideal replacement for my grandfather. He doesn't game, unless you count Spider Solitaire, but its new and has enough grunt to drive his single 4k display.
If he doesn't play games, Im surprised that you are looking at an actual gaming GPU.

You could just get him a GT 1030 or something. Those are currently in stock (at least in the UK), and go for less than £100.

Should be more than enough to power a screen (even at 4K), and, erm, Solitaire.
 

Gordon_4

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If he doesn't play games, Im surprised that you are looking at an actual gaming GPU.

You could just get him a GT 1030 or something. Those are currently in stock (at least in the UK), and go for less than £100.

Should be more than enough to power a screen (even at 4K), and, erm, Solitaire.
The GT 1030 is about $150 here, so not a bad price but I guess I'm just deathly afraid if I don't include something with some overhead, an update somewhere is gonna come around and just fuck his shit up as Windows is occasionally wont to do.
 

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That is an amazing price. I typically see them for more like $150 in these times, in which case I'd be out about $75 for a premium price rather than the normal $75ish. Better than spending $600 on a $150 card.

EDIT: Appears this is a thing now. Advised to ensure you are getting a DDR5 version.

Do not buy a GT 730. Not saying you were planning to, but as a word of caution: just don't.

They are that 'manufactured e-waste' Gordon_4 mentioned above. They're actually just rebranded GT 630s, or sometimes even 430/440s. But even if you did get the absolute best possible version, it would still get outperformed by the integrated graphics on any cpu from the last couple years. By quite a lot even, if we're talking the most recent Intel and Amd gens. There is only one situation in which buying a GT 730 is not a waste of money (and even then): your current gpu broke and your cpu has no integrated graphics, so you just need something in there just so your system can boot.

If that were to happen to you? Get a Ryzen 5600G cpu.

Iirc, you have a Ryzen 1700, so this imo currently one of your better options. Ok, 5600G goes for $220, which is a good deal more than 75, but also way less than 600. But above all else, has plain better graphics performance than a GT 730 (about on par with a 1030 afaik). It can tide you over until proper dedicated gpus hopefully become affordable again and has the nice added bonus of giving you a substantial cpu upgrade.
 

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Do not buy a GT 730. Not saying you were planning to, but as a word of caution: just don't.

They are that 'manufactured e-waste' Gordon_4 mentioned above. They're actually just rebranded GT 630s, or sometimes even 430/440s. But even if you did get the absolute best possible version, it would still get outperformed by the integrated graphics on any cpu from the last couple years. By quite a lot even, if we're talking the most recent Intel and Amd gens. There is only one situation in which buying a GT 730 is not a waste of money (and even then): your current gpu broke and your cpu has no integrated graphics, so you just need something in there just so your system can boot.

If that were to happen to you? Get a Ryzen 5600G cpu.

Iirc, you have a Ryzen 1700, so this imo currently one of your better options. Ok, 5600G goes for $220, which is a good deal more than 75, but also way less than 600. But above all else, has plain better graphics performance than a GT 730 (about on par with a 1030 afaik). It can tide you over until proper dedicated gpus hopefully become affordable again and has the nice added bonus of giving you a substantial cpu upgrade.
That is a great solution in an emergency! Looks like this is a thing too.


And for CPU benchmarks:
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+Ryzen+5+5600G&id=4325 Scores around 20K
vs
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+Ryzen+7+1700&id=2970 Scores around 15K

I think the socket will be unchanged, so it will fit my mother board. I'll be sure if the need sadly ever happens.

Thanks again!
 

Chimpzy

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That is a great solution in an emergency! Looks like this is a thing too.


And for CPU benchmarks:
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+Ryzen+5+5600G&id=4325 Scores around 20K
vs
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+Ryzen+7+1700&id=2970 Scores around 15K

I think the socket will be unchanged, so it will fit my mother board. I'll be sure if the need sadly ever happens.

Thanks again!
You're welcome. And yes, Ryzen gen 1 through 4 all use the AM4 socket, tho you would very likely need to flash the bios on your mobo for a 5000 series cpu.
 
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You're welcome. And yes, Ryzen gen 1 through 4 all use the AM4 socket, tho you would very likely need to flash the bios on your mobo for a 5000 series cpu.
There was just an LTT video on that today:

 
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EvilRoy

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There was just an LTT video on that today:

This is what I've been doing and thus far I'm very happy with the asrock/amd situation. I really haven't seen performance issues even on cpu intensive tasks like fea modelling or trying to play satisfactory on a server.

Just the GPU issue that has been persisting.
 

Gordon_4

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Do not buy a GT 730. Not saying you were planning to, but as a word of caution: just don't.

They are that 'manufactured e-waste' Gordon_4 mentioned above. They're actually just rebranded GT 630s, or sometimes even 430/440s. But even if you did get the absolute best possible version, it would still get outperformed by the integrated graphics on any cpu from the last couple years. By quite a lot even, if we're talking the most recent Intel and Amd gens. There is only one situation in which buying a GT 730 is not a waste of money (and even then): your current gpu broke and your cpu has no integrated graphics, so you just need something in there just so your system can boot.

If that were to happen to you? Get a Ryzen 5600G cpu.

Iirc, you have a Ryzen 1700, so this imo currently one of your better options. Ok, 5600G goes for $220, which is a good deal more than 75, but also way less than 600. But above all else, has plain better graphics performance than a GT 730 (about on par with a 1030 afaik). It can tide you over until proper dedicated gpus hopefully become affordable again and has the nice added bonus of giving you a substantial cpu upgrade.
I just watched an older stream from LTT where they built a budget PC around the 6500XT and from what he was saying, it sounds to me like the card might have been worth a squirt if it had the full 16 PCI-E Gen4 lanes, a 256bit ram interface and 6GB of vRAM.

Or maybe that would have made it attractive to miners and subverted the stated reason for its existence.
 

Chimpzy

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I just watched an older stream from LTT where they built a budget PC around the 6500XT and from what he was saying, it sounds to me like the card might have been worth a squirt if it had the full 16 PCI-E Gen4 lanes, a 256bit ram interface and 6GB of vRAM.

Or maybe that would have made it attractive to miners and subverted the stated reason for its existence.
Possible, but as it stands, they ended up with a product that doesn't really satisfy anyone, except the most desperate.
 

Gordon_4

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Possible, but as it stands, they ended up with a product that doesn't really satisfy anyone, except the most desperate.
What's funny though is even that thing kicked the much vaunted AMD APU across the playground. Also more games need that feature that measures how much vRAM your settings (will probably) use that Doom Eternal has. That seems really useful for settings tweaking.
 

Chimpzy

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What's funny though is even that thing kicked the much vaunted AMD APU across the playground.
Well, it would be pretty embarrasing if an proper new dGPU (ignoring garbage like the GT 710/730/1030) couldn't outperform an APU.
Also more games need that feature that measures how much vRAM your settings (will probably) use that Doom Eternal has. That seems really useful for settings tweaking.
Yeh, it's nice. Iirc, RE2 remake and RE8 have it too, tho it seemed pretty inaccurate compared to what Afterburner told me I was using. Tho Afterburners metrics aren't entirely reliable either.
 

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Also more games need that feature that measures how much vRAM your settings (will probably) use that Doom Eternal has. That seems really useful for settings tweaking.
A lot of newer AAA games have that now. I think the last 3 call of duties have it, Cyberpunk 2077 had it, I don't remember if Halo Infinite had it but I think it did.
 

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Well things are actually going on sale on the newegg.ca site which hasn't happened in months to years. Sales aren't crazy, 20% max on older cards, but it at least implies that demand is dropping as people wait for cheaper cards.
 

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Well things are actually going on sale on the newegg.ca site which hasn't happened in months to years. Sales aren't crazy, 20% max on older cards, but it at least implies that demand is dropping as people wait for cheaper cards.
Well just don't buy anything open box I guess...


 
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