AMD Card Prices Skyrocket due to cryptocurrency mining?

[DefStar]

The 7970 I bought new from Newegg for $289 this summer is now $469!!!

http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/17...gaming-efforts

Should I consider selling a pair of 7970s I bought at less than MSRP for a profit now, in anticipation that the prices will drop back to MSRP?

Please discuss...

[zanzabar]

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you could just start buying NV cards, you cannot mine with those effectively. i was thinking of selling my 7950 (they sell for about $350 right now) and getting a 770.

[AliG]

you could just start buying NV cards, you cannot mine with those effectively. i was thinking of selling my 7950 (they sell for about $350 right now) and getting a 770.

May as well, you'd probably pull a profit while getting a better gaming card. But I'd act fast, bitcoin is drastically losing value because of all the hackings, and I personally think it'll be effectively extinct in under a year because no one using it for purely an investment (and not to launder money etc) would find it safer than the stock market with the current bull run

[DefStar]

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I would'nt be 'fleecing' anyone as the invisible hand guides the market and that is the cost of a 7970 at this time of which happens to be the very same point in time they would desire the card...at the very most I would be saving him/her money by not having to go 'new' and I have already verified my cards are not DOA duds...since they would require a card now at this time.

If you really look at the situation I am the one taking a loss...lost time as I will not be able to play games or bench until I buy a new card(s)...and even then AMD might get the balls to up the MSRP and I might get screwed for taking the chance.
So I am just trying to make an educated guess here based on the vast knowledge of my very awesome peers here at Xtreme Systems.

[yojimbo197]

May as well, you'd probably pull a profit while getting a better gaming card. But I'd act fast, bitcoin is drastically losing value because of all the hackings, and I personally think it'll be effectively extinct in under a year because no one using it for purely an investment (and not to launder money etc) would find it safer than the stock market with the current bull run

Bitcoin miners, at least the successful ones had switched to ASIC mining equipment long before the AMD card price runup. This price increase on the upper 7 series cards and 280-290 card iis more attributable to Litecoin mining, which was much easier to mine until around Nov-Dec when the difficulty tripled. As well, there are other crytocurrencies that people are mining in the hope that they will catch on and be part of the initial surge like Bitcoin and Litecoin.

[DefStar]

Bitcoin miners, at least the successful ones had switched to ASIC mining equipment long before the AMD card price runup. This price increase on the upper 7 series cards and 280-290 card iis more attributable to Litecoin mining, which was much easier to mine until around Nov-Dec when the difficulty tripled. As well, there are other crytocurrencies that people are mining in the hope that they will catch on and be part of the initial surge like Bitcoin and Litecoin.

Thank you, this is the direction I intended the discussion to go I was aware that the bit-coining complexity was beyond what any AMD card could do while still turning a profit. What you are saying makes sense.

[AliG]

Bitcoin miners, at least the successful ones had switched to ASIC mining equipment long before the AMD card price runup. This price increase on the upper 7 series cards and 280-290 card iis more attributable to Litecoin mining, which was much easier to mine until around Nov-Dec when the difficulty tripled. As well, there are other crytocurrencies that people are mining in the hope that they will catch on and be part of the initial surge like Bitcoin and Litecoin.

I highly doubt that will happen. Irrational exuberance only works for so long, and even if bitcoin didn't have the hacking issues most people would agree that was a bubble waiting to burst. I can't see people taking other digital currencies seriously until the investment actually seems safe

[DefStar]

I highly doubt that will happen. Irrational exuberance only works for so long, and even if bitcoin didn't have the hacking issues most people would agree that was a bubble waiting to burst. I can't see people taking other digital currencies seriously until the investment actually seems safe

Exactly, and bit-coining from any government's prospective seems like another way for corporations to circumvent taxes...which means 99% of the population would get taxed even more. Bitcoin would have hurt the middle class...bad.

[R101]

Nvidia has added hardware functions needed to 'mine' effectively, as can be seen in 750 Ti. AMD cards will become obsolete for mining soon enough, so if you were thinking of selling your used cards, do that right away.

[figuretti]

The problem with the review at Tom's it's the settings... nobody mines without tweak the settings... yeah, the 750Ti it's a good GPU for mining... but the values they show for the AMD card's are way too low in some cases... why I say this?? cause I got a 260X & 270X mining full 24/7



Here the 270X makes just 302 KH/s and the 260X just 206 KH/s...

My 270X makes 470 KH/s with this settings --gpu-engine 1115 --gpu-memclock 1500 --gpu-powertune 20 --gpu-fan 75 --gpu-threads 1 --vectors 1 --worksize 512 --thread-concurrency 15232 --intensity 19 --no-submit-stale

And my 260X makes 265 KH/s with this settings --gpu-engine 925 --gpu-memclock 1850 --gpu-powertune 20 --gpu-fan 70 --gpu-threads 1 --vectors 1 --worksize 256 --thread-concurrency 8000 --intensity 19 --no-submit-stale

Cudaminer automatically detects and optimizes the miner for the Nvidia card (previous to my 270X i was having a GTX 660 Ti with cudaminer, and i was getting 310 KH/s with auto detect and some overclock on the gpu core), but CGMiner requires manual tweaking to get the best results, and that includes overclock/downclock to the best ratio...

Edit: yeah, Maxwell has future in mining... but I don't think it gonna steal the crown on AMD in this segment... cause we don't know anything about the performance in the future AMD 300 series

[Andrew LB]

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you could just start buying NV cards, you cannot mine with those effectively. i was thinking of selling my 7950 (they sell for about $350 right now) and getting a 770.

I take it you haven't seen the performance of the low end maxwell 750ti? It wipes the floor with all the cards out there when you factor in price and performance/watt. Performance/watt is everything when mining.

[LordEC911]

I take it you haven't seen the performance of the low end maxwell 750ti? It wipes the floor with all the cards out there when you factor in price and performance/watt. Performance/watt is everything when mining.

No, no it is not. There are many more variables involved.

[tool_462]

May as well, you'd probably pull a profit while getting a better gaming card. But I'd act fast, bitcoin is drastically losing value because of all the hackings, and I personally think it'll be effectively extinct in under a year because no one using it for purely an investment (and not to launder money etc) would find it safer than the stock market with the current bull run

@OP: Sell the cards if you don't mine, grab a better version in Green form, profit!

[DefStar]

@OP: Sell the cards if you don't mine, grab a better version in Green form, profit!

I would be hoping AMD cards return to MSRP value and getting a 290X with a water-block... but thanks.

The real problem is that I have EK water-blocks on both cards and I don't want to take them off and sell separate; Cause then I would have to order some new 1mm thermal pads which are expensive and thermal compound to reapply the air-cooler...so this really limits my customer base to water-cooling people which are most likely like us and not going to buy the cards at this price. Crap, If I want to do this I will have to sell the water-blocks separately...its not a simple case of just cleaning the cards up a re-boxing them for me.

I was/(n't) posting the story for advice but more to discuss/predict this bit-coin bubble (I thought it was interesting), will it pop, and if AMD video cards will return to their MSRP values...which yes is totally relevant to the after thought I had of me selling them.

[yojimbo197]

I would be hoping AMD cards return to MSRP value and getting a 290X with a water-block... but thanks.

The real problem is that I have EK water-blocks on both cards and I don't want to take them off and sell separate; Cause then I would have to order some new 1mm thermal pads which are expensive and thermal compound to reapply the air-cooler...so this really limits my customer base to water-cooling people which are most likely like us and not going to buy the cards at this price. Crap, If I want to do this I will have to sell the water-blocks separately...its not a simple case of just cleaning the cards up a re-boxing them for me.

I was/(n't) posting the story for advice but more to discuss/predict this bit-coin bubble (I thought it was interesting), will it pop, and if AMD video cards will return to their MSRP values...which yes is totally relevant to the after thought I had of me selling them.

How long it takes for AMD cards to come back to "normal" prices isn't something readily quantifiable. Though if Bitcoin keeps going down, it may drag all the other currencies down, which would make it unprofitable. However, you can never underestimate the power of denial, especially when its "easy money" people are after. My guess is that the only people making a lot of money besides a few crazy mining outfits/conglomerates and a few whole house/apt mining rig nutbars are computer/electronic suppliers, AMD card sellers, riser card sellers, LTC/alt coin rig builders/sellers, and power companies. If I were you I'd root for the Litecoin ASIC miners to be released soon. But I haven't seen anything that indicates that they are more than vaporware at this point.

I'd be tempted to sell the cards and get a GTX 780. Otherwise you might be in for a long wait for AMD R9 280 and 290 prices to go back down to "normal". I can tell you that even used 78XX or 79XX series cards on Craigslist disappear faster than Kobayashi's first hot dog, at least in the tri-state area here.

[DefStar]

I would love to use Craig's list but i'm out in the sticks and Ebay would take literally $100 of the profit I would make off the card sale.

@yojimbo987,do you think my assessment about removing the water-blocks is correct.

[PedantOne]

it is a lie, it is not because mining, but a catastrophic shortage of chips, amd ordered them only a small numbers at TSMC, has no money for manufacturing. The same is at CPUs too.

[Tim]

I dunno about the rest of the world, but every time I check 290(x) prices here in the UK they have been steady, and plenty of stock.

[AliG]

I dunno about the rest of the world, but every time I check 290(x) prices here in the UK they have been steady, and plenty of stock.

You should buy a few then put them up on the classifieds section. At one point they were $899 on newegg, though have since fallen down to $649 (which is still a big markup)

[Sparky]

it is a lie, it is not because mining, but a catastrophic shortage of chips, amd ordered them only a small numbers at TSMC, has no money for manufacturing. The same is at CPUs too.

Right

[qcmadness]

it is a lie, it is not because mining, but a catastrophic shortage of chips, amd ordered them only a small numbers at TSMC, has no money for manufacturing. The same is at CPUs too.

Why don't order more chips?
Unless AMD does not see the chips as profitable.

[BeepBeep2]

If I were you I'd root for the Litecoin ASIC miners to be released soon. But I haven't seen anything that indicates that they are more than vaporware at this point.

Gridseed ASICs are real and attainable. $250 / 330 khash/s @ 15w.

[Heinz68]

it is a lie, it is not because mining, but a catastrophic shortage of chips, amd ordered them only a small numbers at TSMC, has no money for manufacturing. The same is at CPUs too.

Yes it's a lie, but it's you who lies and making up stories. You're one the biggest AMD troll i know, no wonder you are banned on this and other forums with the nick 'OBR', and this is going on for few years. WTF did AMD do to you for hating them so much.

THE FACT IS, about first 10 days Newegg was selling the cards at MSRP as fast as they were coming in, which is normal for HOT new cards before the inventory builds up.

Few days later one of the R9 290X actually was for sale at Newegg for $499 compared to MSRP $549, just to show you there was not any shortage at that point.

Than the Litecoin mining craze hit big time when Litecoin value just in few days went up from about $2.00 up to $48.00 and all AMD cards got sold out fast, not only the R9 series including the 280 but also the 7000 series.
http://www.ltc-charts.com/period-cha...d&market=btc-e

No way anybody at AMD could have predicted that maybe you genius could have.

Anyway at that point AMD did renegotiated the contract with TSMC for more supply and even introduced back on the market some of 7000 series (miners fav card) to take some pressure from the R9 series, I remember reading that on Twitter.

The bottom line is even with the mining craze there was not any "catastrophic shortage of chips", plenty of cards in Europe at not much inflated prices if any, as you should know (so why even post such baloney). Even In North America where the supply was much more affected by the mining, there was always some cards at Newegg, the problem was at inflated prices mostly only some miners were willing to pay for (my guess).

The problem also was Newegg started selling mining kits with 4 to 6 cards making much more money that way.

At least you should have look at the article in the OP before posting anything, there is a history price chart for one of the R9 290 card confirming it's all about mining and not AMD contracting too few cards for normal market.

Now I'm upset with myself wasting so much ink on a troll, but it's more for others who don't know him and might believe anything he ever says about AMD.

[Hornet331]

it is a lie, it is not because mining, but a catastrophic shortage of chips, amd ordered them only a small numbers at TSMC, has no money for manufacturing. The same is at CPUs too.

thats why they are available in masses in the EU, right?

The only cards that are abit harder to come by are the 280Xs, and probably because the majority of shipments are sucked up the the US market.

rest is sold below msrp here.

[Buckeye]

Ok guys let's cut it out.
Just like everyone here, people have their opinions so lets keep it civil please.