Graphics Card Price Wars: How to Score a Card (If You Must)

[kewlguy239]

Tom's tools and tricks for finding a powerful graphics card in today's overpriced, under-supplied market.

Graphics Card Price Wars: How to Score a Card (If You Must) : Read more

 

[TEAMSWITCHER]

The situation is ridiculous ... No one is buying DIY-PC hardware right now ... new or used. You can't sell your old hardware, and can't get a new GPU to accompany new hardware. I think I'm just gonna skip this upgrade year altogether and get a new MacBook Pro instead, once the 2018 models are available.

 

[jaber2]

I would wait until April when the new Nvidia cards come out and pre-order one

 

[InvalidError]

You can't sell your old hardware, and can't get a new GPU to accompany new hardware.

There is a simple fix for that: simply spot-upgrade whatever yields the greatest immediate benefits and carry everything else over. That's what I've been doing with my PCs for 20+ years. If a new GPU at current prices isn't yielding cost-benefit good enough to justify the expense, carry over your current GPU and continue using it until you can justify the cost. Once you get over the itch of getting new-everything all the time, owning and upgrading a PC gets much cheaper.

 

[ibjeepr]

"You might snag a "parts bundle" deal and sell off the components you don't need, keeping only the graphics card."

Which the miners are going to do as well...

 

[13thmonkey]

The situation is ridiculous ... No one is buying DIY-PC hardware right now ... new or used. You can't sell your old hardware, and can't get a new GPU to accompany new hardware. I think I'm just gonna skip this upgrade year altogether and get a new MacBook Pro instead, once the 2018 models are available.

How does a macbook pro replace what a GPU can do? You either need portability or you don't.

 

[redgarl]

Well, AMD APU are sold out already... since the release day. I never seen something like this.

 

[redgarl]

You can't sell your old hardware, and can't get a new GPU to accompany new hardware.

There is a simple fix for that: simply spot-upgrade whatever yields the greatest immediate benefits and carry everything else over. That's what I've been doing with my PCs for 20+ years. If a new GPU at current prices isn't yielding cost-benefit good enough to justify the expense, carry over your current GPU and continue using it until you can justify the cost. Once you get over the itch of getting new-everything all the time, owning and upgrading a PC gets much cheaper.

I prefer the scratch built option and waiting when everything align together. Buying parts in advance is usually not the best option. Your needs may changes or the symbiosis of your components is going to be affected. If we are talking for a month or so, no big deal, but over a year, it is usually a bad idea.

Your warranty wear off, your return window expire and your RMA process will be worst. Also, companies are having a 30-60 days policy window for brand new replacement.

 

[Hal-Jordan]

I look for the top of the line high performance card that's being hyped, and then buy the one that it replaced. It seems like usually there is only a 1-2 percent improvement in performance but the price is way too high.

 

[manleysteele]

Or you can just go to the manufacturers store page and buy one at close to the list price. What? Your favorite manufacturer doesn't have a store page? Change manufacturers.

 

[BaRoMeTrIc]

I think this is a generational thing but everyone is up in arms because they avent been able to buy a gpu for 2 months, prices DID drop in November and December. Everyone needs to have the shiney new toys right here and right now. Just wait it out. AMD, and Nvidia are not stupid they will produce more cards but they aren't going to go overboard and get themselves and their AIBs stuck with months of unsaleable inventory. Just be patient. or buy an XBOX and play crappy overpriced games @ 30 fps

 

[InvalidError]

I prefer the scratch built option and waiting when everything align together. Buying parts in advance is usually not the best option.

I wasn't advocating "buying in advance" though. When I buy a new CPU+MoBo+RAM, I don't wait until I buy a new GPU, HDD, SSD, etc. months later (usually more like years for me), I put them to work right away because I actually need that part of my eventually fully refreshed system right away. If I buy a new PSU, I put it in right away. When I eventually upgrade the GPU, I put that in right away. Etc.

Balance? I consider that a largely pointless concept as there is no such thing as a perfectly balanced system unless all you ever do with your PC is run the only 2-3 games which may be optimal for any given CPU-RAM-GPU-resolution-details-etc. combination. One or the other is going to be the dominant bottleneck in all other cases and a GPU bottleneck can easily be loosened if not eliminated by reducing details to extend a GPU's useful life as needed. I see absolutely no need to tie CPU-MoBo-RAM upgrades to GPU upgrades and mine are 2-3 years out of cycle with each other.

 

[Kahless01]

i dont think nvidia is coming out with new generation. not from what ive been told by people in the biz. why would they need to really? theyre still on top with the 1080ti and nothing amd makes can come close.

 

[InvalidError]

i dont think nvidia is coming out with new generation. not from what ive been told by people in the biz. why would they need to really? theyre still on top with the 1080ti and nothing amd makes can come close.

Because market will eventually reach over-saturation (if that hasn't happened already but is being obfuscated by mining) and if Nvidia doesn't put something new on the market first, the market will get flooded with their old stuff and undermine its ability to sell its new stuff.

If you sit on your laurels for too long, you become your own competition. It becomes difficult to continue selling your old stuff when everyone who wants it already got it. That's similar to how PC sales are declining because everyone who wants one already got one and a growing number of people are fine with just their phone or tablet.

 

[timf79]

The Titan XP is still avail at Nvidia for MSRP, not sure what the issue is?

 

[ibjeepr]

I prefer the scratch built option and waiting when everything align together. Buying parts in advance is usually not the best option.

I wasn't advocating "buying in advance" though. When I buy a new CPU+MoBo+RAM, I don't wait until I buy a new GPU, HDD, SSD, etc. months later (usually more like years for me), I put them to work right away because I actually need that part of my eventually fully refreshed system right away. If I buy a new PSU, I put it in right away. When I eventually upgrade the GPU, I put that in right away. Etc.

Balance? I consider that a largely pointless concept as there is no such thing as a perfectly balanced system unless all you ever do with your PC is run the only 2-3 games which may be optimal for any given CPU-RAM-GPU-resolution-details-etc. combination. One or the other is going to be the dominant bottleneck in all other cases and a GPU bottleneck can easily be loosened if not eliminated by reducing details to extend a GPU's useful life as needed. I see absolutely no need to tie CPU-MoBo-RAM upgrades to GPU upgrades and mine are 2-3 years out of cycle with each other.

I agree, as I posted in a different thread a while back:
"In 2 - 3 years you upgrade the GPU. In 4 -5 years you build a new system (minus the GPU). ...off-setting the GPU upgrade cycle from the system build cycle allows you to separate those costs. You can save to buy a better GPU then save to build a new system with out the GPU cost."

I keep Mobo+CPU+Ram as a unified purchase though obviously due to the time between upgrades (every 4-5 yrs about) and how interlinked they are as compatibility / features change.

 

[ibjeepr]

The Titan XP is still avail at Nvidia for MSRP, not sure what the issue is?

Maybe the issue is that not everyone can / wants to spend $1200 on a video card.
The Titan V is available too. Should we all just drop $3k on that when the Xp is sold out?

 

[InvalidError]

I keep Mobo+CPU+Ram as a unified purchase though obviously due to the time between upgrades (every 4-5 yrs about) and how interlinked they are as compatibility / features change.

Pretty much. From 1998 until now, I've been upgrading CPU-MoBo-RAM every four years and that basically meant only one PC per memory standard generation, so no carry-over opportunity there. With my five years old i5-3470, I may end up skipping DDR4 altogether as I have yet to begin feeling an upgrade itch and am in no hurry to spend ~$400 to match my i5's 32GB DDR3 which I originally paid ~$180.

 

[Fulgurant]

The Titan XP is still avail at Nvidia for MSRP, not sure what the issue is?

Excellent satire

 

[Loadedaxe]

So the miners buy up all the bundles and sell off the un neeeded parts as well.

Newegg isnt solving the problem, they are just selling more and profiting more.

 

[ta3miyyasandwich]

Found a used Gigabyte Gaming G1 970 for 190 USD equivalent, is that a good price? Sorry if this is inappropriate.

 

[InvalidError]

Newegg isnt solving the problem, they are just selling more and profiting more.

For Newegg to make more profit, it needs to make a bigger margin on the extra components than the extra markup it earns from selling the GPUs stand-alone. I wouldn't be so sure that it makes that much more net money from sacrificing a $300-500 markup on the GPUs. Buying dozens of partial rigs and re-selling the parts at a loss (often no shipping when ordering direct, buying over the net usually means at least shipping charges and related costs) isn't something many would consider worth the hassle either for large-scale crypto-mining.

 

[Rexer]

I managed to buy a Vega 64 In early November at the retail price ($500.00) (which I feel highly fortunate). I wanted a second one but I can't jump at the prices I've seen. I've sorta just pushed aside my new computer project to watch what AMD and NVIDIA do. It's crazy watching the gpu and cryptocurrency prices gyrate. I buy coin but I don't mine so being a spectator is really depressing.

 

[bit_user]

You can't sell your old hardware, and can't get a new GPU to accompany new hardware.

There is a simple fix for that: simply spot-upgrade whatever yields the greatest immediate benefits and carry everything else over.

Yes, that's what most reasonable people will do. But it's of no help if your GPU is one of the most obsolete components (which is frequently the case, since the generational improvements have been pretty big and steady). This is not a solution.

 

[bit_user]

The Titan XP is still avail at Nvidia for MSRP, not sure what the issue is?

Lol at the idea of a $1200 GPU sounding like a reasonable option.

I thought I was spending a lot on a GPU when I got my current one (980 Ti) for $450. Prior to that, I spent $225. Before that, probably about $150. I half-expected to spend ~$700 on the next one (maybe 1180 Ti or something like that), but there's pretty much no chance of me spending > $1k.