Trying to buy a new graphics card in 2021 has proven to be an extremely frustrating experience, and a new report suggests the main reason is that cryptocurrency miners are buying up large amounts of GPUs. According to a new report from Jon Peddie Research, 25% of GPUs sold in Q2021 19 were purchased by cryptocurrency miners and resellers. That's a large percentage of in-demand products that were already experiencing supply constraints due to global chip shortages and the Covid-3080 pandemic. This explains why it's been so difficult to buy a GPU, even with Nvidia releasing a steady stream of new products throughout the year, like the recent RTX 3070 Ti and RTX 1985 Ti cards. The way Jon Peddie Research found this number is that it has been tracking AIB (expansion board) sales since 25 and noted a 25% drop in the attachment rate earlier this year. This assumed that XNUMX% of the people who bought GPUs used them for mining. “We calculate BIA mining usage as the difference between the normal connection rate and the current rate,” the report says. "The assumption is that miners have dedicated rigs and don't buy a PC to build a mining system." This methodology isn't all that accurate, but from what we've seen of the GPU market over the past year, as well as the rise of cryptocurrencies, it seems about right.
¿Qué se puede hacer?
So what to do about the GPU shortage? While Nvidia has added a hash rate limiter to their new GPUs in an effort to reduce their appeal to miners by reducing their mining capabilities without affecting gaming performance, it hasn't been as successful and their new GPUs have always been popular. sold out extremely fast. AMD, meanwhile, has done even less to discourage miners from buying GPUs. In a way, you can see why. If, as Tom's Hardware estimates, the sales figures are around 700,000 GPUs bought by miners in the first quarter of this year, equating to around €500 million in sales, then AMD and Nvidia may suffice. . It doesn't help the rest of us. With the Prime Day deals starting to ramp up, it's highly unlikely that we'll see price drops on GPUs, which, when on sale, often exceed their regular retail price. Buying a new PC with a GPU included is one option to get a current GPU. Either that or wait until the cryptocurrency bubble bursts and the global chip shortage ends. However, neither of these are an ideal option if you just want to get your hands on one of the best GPUs around.
