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In brief: Those currently seeking an upper-mid-range GPU have multiple good options on-hand. The newly released GeForce RTX 4070 has dodged the supply problems that plagued its predecessors two years ago, and AMD has rapidly countered Nvidia’s new offer with significant price drops on some of the top RDNA2 cards.
The RTX 4070 seems to be holding firm to its $600 MSRP in the days following its launch. This week, several good options have appeared around that price point as AMD slashes the Radeon RX 6800 and 6800 XT to $470 and $540, respectively.
The situation contrasts starkly with late 2020, when surging demand and global supply chain disruptions made getting an RTX 3000 or RX 6000 GPU a nightmare. Those cards, like the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series consoles, immediately sold out upon launch and quickly reappeared at inflated prices. Many customers resorted to arcane shopping methods like hiring bots or following Discord notification links into mobile app shopping carts.
We are clearly in a different world two and a half years later. Declining PC hardware markets throughout 2022 show that demand has cooled and supply constraints have loosened. Only the Founders Edition GPUs seem in short supply, with Amazon showing significant markups.
Searching for Nvidia’s latest mid-range GPU on Best Buy and Newegg offers a healthy range of options that customers can add to their shopping carts without much trouble.
Reports that Nvidia isn’t rushing to replenish 40 series stocks further indicate the current state of the GPU market. According to DigiTimes, Team Green hasn’t asked assemblers to ramp up production. Nvidia could be waiting until surplus 30 series inventories sell.
Meanwhile, Newegg is currently selling the Radeon RX 6800 and 6800 XT for over $100 off their MSRP, putting them below the RTX 4070. The deals appear limited but are still up as of now.
TechSpot’s RTX 4070 review ranked its performance and value just above the 6800 GPUs, but the deals change the calculus somewhat. The AMD cards have 16GB of VRAM to the 4070’s 12 GB, and a lack of VRAM has recently been a significant problem for Nvidia cards. The deciding factor in the comparison will likely be how much each consumer values DLSS and Nvidia’s advantages in ray tracing performance.
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Augustine Noren