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A scorching potato: Do you suppose that the RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 are costly? Sadly, these trying to purchase a mannequin from OEMs MSI or Asus needs to be ready to pay much more. The businesses have elevated the costs of their Blackwell choices, in some circumstances by as a lot as virtually $400.
Like most retailers, MSI at the moment has no RTX 5000-series in inventory. Nevertheless, folks observed that the costs all of a sudden elevated on Wednesday.
You’ll be able to see on this archive of its web site that MSI had just one RTX 5080 at its $999 MSRP earlier this week – the GeForce RTX 5080 16G VENTUS 3X. Now, that same card is $1,139, a 14% enhance.
It is the identical story with the RTX 5090. The one card that had been priced at its $1,999 MSRP, additionally a Ventus 3X, is now $2,379, up 19%.
Different merchandise have additionally skilled worth hikes. The OC Plus variant of the RTX 5080 Ventus 3X went from $1,139 to $1,269, whereas the RTX 5090 Vanguard SOC launch version went from $2,379 to $2,689. The most costly mannequin MSI has listed is the Geforce RTX 5090 32G SUPRIM LIQUID SOC for $2,789, whereas the RTX 5080 model is $1,499.
Many of those similar MSI playing cards are on Newegg, the place they’re much more costly – as much as $40 extra.
MSI is not alone in ramping up the costs. Asus’ Blackwell playing cards have additionally elevated. Its Astral RTX 5090 went from $2,799 to $3,079 on Newegg, whereas the Asus Prime GeForce RTX 5080 16 GB jumped from $999 to $1,264.
The state of affairs brings to thoughts the peak of the pandemic, when a confluence of things resulted in an especially restricted provide of graphics playing cards, main opportunistic corporations to lift GPU costs far above their MSRPs.
Additional tariffs on Chinese language items are seemingly contributing to the value hikes, as most graphics playing cards are assembled and examined in China. There are additionally plans to impose tariffs on semiconductors from Taiwan, which might see TSMC increase the value of its semiconductor wafers by as much as 15 p.c this yr – a rise that would in the end be handed on to customers.
