Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies like Ethereum, Ripple, and Litecoin have soared in value over the past year, thanks to continued interest from a range of investors. As the price of these cryptocurrencies has increased, graphics cards have also seen big price increases thanks to retail stock shortages. A range of mid- or high-end graphics cards from AMD or Nvidia are in short supply, mostly due to cryptocurrency miners buying them in bulk to build machines to mine bitcoin and similar cryptocurrencies.
Polygon reports that pricing for Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 1070 should be around $380 (depending on the model), but that some cards are now being sold for more than $700 due to the stock shortages – an increase of more than 80 percent. Cryptocurrency miners use stacks of graphics cards to solve the mathematical problems need to authenticate payments on the network and create new bitcoin. There’s only a finite number of bitcoins available, and because of the way the network is designed, each new bitcoin takes more power to mine. This has led to increased demand for more powerful graphics cards to tackle multiple cryptocurrencies.
The graphics card pricing is making it a lot harder to build a gaming PC from scratch right now, especially as the stock shortages of mid-range cards like the GTX 1060 or GTX 1070 also push up the prices of more capable cards. Nvidia’s GTX 1060, GTX 1070, GTX 1080, and AMD’s Radeon RX 570, 580, Vega 56, and Vega 64 cards have all been impacted in recent months.
Nvidia is advising its retail partners to prioritize gamers over miners, but retailers are able to generate some impressive margins at the moment so it’s unlikely that simple advice will result in real changes. Some retailers are limiting purchases so miners can’t buy stacks of cards, and Polygon reports that Micro Center is specifically offering discounts to PC gamers who are buying the cards alongside other components. Micro Center blames high demand from miners and constrained shipments from vendors for the industry-wide shortages.
It’s a problem that’s affecting pricing worldwide, not just in the US, and it seems unlikely to end unless graphics card vendors can flood the market to keep up with demand. It could put off PC gaming newcomers who are deciding between building a mid-range PC or opting for a PlayStation 4 Pro / Xbox One X. Gamers have had to put up with volatile pricing of RAM over the years, and as Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency pricing continues to fluctuate it’s clear that graphics cards will be the latest bottleneck in building the perfect gaming PC.
Comments
The price of upgrading looks awful at the moment, makes some of the ready to go prebuilt rigs look very competitive in price
By Ponk on 01.30.18 7:53am
No shame in getting a pre-built rig for the sake of cost, but it is a pain in the ass to upgrade ATM.
By chrismo2001 on 01.30.18 12:29pm
Depends on who you go with. I’ve built my last 3 PCs and decided to have someone else do it for me this time, mostly because there wasn’t that big of a cost savings once I factor in the time it would take for me to put it together and get it fully up and running. Mine wasn’t a prebuilt rig, so that may be why it’ll be easier for me to upgrade in the future.
By empty86 on 01.30.18 7:31pm
I got the Alienware Aurora R7. G-Sync got me woke to over 144FPS. I’ll never look at 60FPS the same ever again…
By chrismo2001 on 02.01.18 8:34pm
GPUs are used to mine Ethereum and some other cryptocurrencies but not Bitcoin. ASICs made GPUs obsolete for mining Bitcoin years ago.
By Marco Mitic on 01.30.18 7:53am
But people would just use what they mined to buy Bitcoin.
By MysteryMii215 on 01.30.18 8:10am
Well, some. Some hold onto the alt coins in hopes they will rise in value. Or they trade it for real money on an exchange.
But for sure no one mines Bitcoin on GPUs.
By NothingUnknown on 01.30.18 8:42am
People are not using what they mined to buy Bitcoin. Its price is down by about 40% over the past month.
I dabble in crypto (for fun, not necessarily profit) and while I keep a token amount in Bitcoin because you basically have to (pretty much everything is based on it), some of the cheaper altcoins are more entertaining and potentially more lucrative. This current Bitcoin decline feels different to me than others; it feels like people are finally wising up to its limitations as a currency, and the shine is off it as something you can mine and get for "free".
By badasscat1 on 01.30.18 12:25pm
No they do not, for Cryptocurrencies to grow up first generation coins like Bitcoin, Litecoin and a whole lot of early days trash coins need to die.
Buying Bitcoin today for fiat or anything you mine on a GPU is dumb.
By JannyWoo on 01.30.18 12:30pm
Same applies to statement "miners are mining dollars in mines", because whatever they mine will end up in dollars sooner or later. So, it’s more true that you can mine dollars with pickaxe than that you can mine Bitcoins with GPU (applying your logic and considering not all mined currencies are sold for Bitcoin).
By Marco Mitic on 01.31.18 8:10am
Not just gamers. High-end NVidia GPUs are used for deep learning. Am hoping to build a local machine to cut my AWS bill, but high GPU prices are frustrating to deal with.
By PopcornPenguin on 01.30.18 8:04am
I miss the hope from months ago that this would all go away, and there would be a flood of good, cheap GPUs. I’ll be sticking with my 1050ti until prices never drop.
By JoshLawKelly on 01.30.18 8:19am
If BTC stays above $10,000 , I can see this problem lasting for a very long time. Hopefully Nvidia and AMD can come up with a solution for gamers.
By llamas612 on 01.30.18 8:28am
That price is unsustainable, its going to crash hard and comeback to a realistic price. Its supposed to be a currency not a commodity.
By ttringle on 01.30.18 10:54am
Why can’t you use it as a currency when the valuation is high? There are technical issues that make BTC difficult to use as a currency.
By Disdain on 01.30.18 11:27am
With this much fluctuation, you might exchange something for a lot, a little, or no value. It is the entire point of money to give stuff a value. If you can’t, then that money is worthless.
By Zererico on 02.02.18 10:52pm
I agree. I wonder if there is some way for them to code the cards so they can’t mine anything?
It’s almost worth it to purchase a pre-made gaming PC, take the video card out and replace it with something less capable, and then sell it and put the good card in your rig.
By Mergatroid Mania on 01.30.18 11:31am
People always find a way to get around stuff like this.
By MysteryMii215 on 01.30.18 11:32am
That’s true, but it would hopefully limit the number of people doing it because the barrier to entry is higher. The issue I see is that this solution basically means we as consumers are saying it’s okay for the company to control what we can and can’t do with a product. That stuff goes on already with the big tech companies creating "walled gardens", but it still doesn’t make it the right or a good solution.
By JoshLawKelly on 01.30.18 11:53am
Same boat here man
By Casper Høj Svendsen on 01.30.18 9:37am
What’s worse is that this is affecting ALL GPUs, not just high end or new ones. My GPU just died, so I figured I’d buy an older, crappier one to tide me over during this high price period. Even GTX 660s (a 6 year old card) are going for $80-$100! I genuinely don’t know what to do at this point.
By llamas612 on 01.30.18 8:27am
You can always buy a console if your purpose is for gaming…lol.
By Crysis Complex on 01.30.18 9:02am
Not if you want to play Divinity: Original Sin 2
I was in the middle of a fight (that I was winning!) when the thing blew out.
By llamas612 on 01.30.18 9:53am
That game could run on integrated graphics…
By SunAraw on 01.30.18 10:38am
Not if you’re on an old CPU. I never upgraded, since everything is GPU bound these days. My i5 2500’s onboard graphics doesn’t support DX11, so I can’t even start the game (hence me being ok with a crappy card for now).
By llamas612 on 01.30.18 11:04am