Future hardware vs gaming?

[steamsux]

So to start off, I am sure many modders and users alike have noticed the insane prices on GFX cards lately. With NVIDIA selling point for the RTX 20 series and 30 series being between 400-600$ for average pricing. Now pop into Amazon or if you manage to get one from Bestbuy or other retailer brand.....The markup is near a grand, or the average price of rent for a one bedroom in the US *Roughly*. So I am curious as I have been working on a few vr projects for a while now....Where does this lead both dev and consumers in the future?

A lot of these issues stem to crypto miners and their nature to buying these cards out for their own endeavors in huge bulk. Apparently in some of the larger operations i.e. within China there is an estimated 2 million dollars worth of cards per large operation. Which has put me to question is there a future for those of us, who utilize these cards for our work or play? How does this affect the gaming community in the long run? And finally with such an issue as obtaining it for those who are living below the expenditures required to make such a purchase, due to the overly inflated cost, does this mean potential loss of players on the PC and possibly future console side of things?

Sorry for the lack of citation, I was just tossing off everything I was thinking of this moment; There are plenty of articles leading to these issues across Google, Bing some discords and other social platforms.

[HeyYou]

The latest iteration of 30 series cards are "Low Hash Rate", so, they suck for mining. A large part of the inflated pricing was due to the shortage of chips, caused by the pandemic shutting down most production. We are still in recovery from that, but, the market IS loosening up. Give it another year, and assuming the pandemic doesn't cause us more shutdowns, prices should return to some semblance of 'normal'. Don't expect them to be priced the same as the 20 series cards were though, prices on EVERYTHING have gone up, and while I expect them to come down some, I do not expect them to return to pre-pandemic levels anytime soon.

[xrayy]

true, i guess the gpu prices will not reach the pre pandemic levels again as long people pay the current prices. and it seems they do.

buy or die :wink:

[ScytheBearer]

Keep in mind that the half-life on hardware currently stands at about three years. The latest and greatest today will be outdated in three years and obsolete in six. That puts one hellova churn in the pricing models for hardware. No matter which way you go, maintaining currency is expensive.

[HeyYou]

Keep in mind that the half-life on hardware currently stands at about three years. The latest and greatest today will be outdated in three years and obsolete in six. That puts one hellova churn in the pricing models for hardware. No matter which way you go, maintaining currency is expensive.

I think three years is really optimistic. It was about two years between the 20 series, and 30 series Nvidia cards... and the performance jump was tremendous. (and going from a 10 series, to a 30 series? HOLY SMOKE! :D )

 

However, "Old" does not necessarily imply "useless", The previous incarnation of my gaming machine lasted me 8 years. I just upgraded the video card a couple times. (twice, I think, once was because they gave me a better card on my RMA.) So far, I haven't seem many games that can actually take advantage of more than two cores either..... So the older processors, with higher clock speeds, can actually perform BETTER in games than some of the newer ones. Yeah, Imagine my surprise. :D

 

All that said though, given that game development is at minimum, three years, and usually longer, the hardware that the game started on, is already way out of date, as compared to the current market. So, if your hardware isn't truly old, it should run most games fairly well.

 

I think it's more video technology that keeps upping the game though...... And the vid card market is TIGHT. Prices on cards are getting stupid again, and thats if you can even FIND one...... We have some 3080Ti's in stock at the moment, that we will sell for almost 2 grand a whack, and those will be gone by the end of the week.

[JimboUK]

Keep in mind that the half-life on hardware currently stands at about three years. The latest and greatest today will be outdated in three years and obsolete in six. That puts one hellova churn in the pricing models for hardware. No matter which way you go, maintaining currency is expensive.

 

I have a i7 6700k from late 2015 and a 1080ti from 2017 and they're both still going strong at 1440p, the performance is good enough for me to be comfortable with waiting for prices to stabilise.

[Stormchaser1]

Top of the line computer lag free 25 years ago to play MUDS and MMOs Lag Free were $10,000-15,000. My $2500 Graphic Card is inferior to today's Graphic Cards. A $600 graphic card which came out during WoW Beta were called "Welfare Graphic Queens". You can get a top of the line computer lag free for under $1500. Inflation did not hurt the computer industry at all. Only thing that hurt is the business cable fiberoptics there is zero need for T5 Lines which costed $25,000 to wire your business or house. You are blessed with cheaper computers than 25 years ago.

[Stormchaser1]

My answer is definitely gaming because there are so many different characteristics in this industry that elevate it above others. The excitement in this business is justified by the fact that it allows you to perform various tasks using https://joywallet.com/article/solitaire-cash-review/. Solitaire is my favorite game ever since I was a kid, and that's why I have to look for different information about it often to be able to get more success. I am sure you understand what I mean.

10-15 years I get a new computer every 10 years. Top of the Line Graphic Cards last 10-15 years and have updates for the next 10 years.

 

I have 3 obsolete computers Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows XP, and I am currently running my Windows 12 Alpha computer. Windows 12 is GAMER ARMAGEDDON!!! 60% of video games are obsolete and make unusable if made over 10 years ago or are not updated to 2019 C+++.

[streetyson]

Spoilt rich-kid problems, crying in their bedrooms over prices of an RTX7080 (or some such) their mommy won't buy them. I still game on an old HP Elite 8000 chassis from 2009 (which I bought 2nd-hand in 2017, still running XP). Then in 2020 I went totally lock-down crazy and fitted it with a 2nd-hand 8200 motherboard and i7-2600 - and then last year I shelled out a princely £70 for a 2nd-hand gtx1050, for which I also grudgingly updated to Windows 7. That's modern gaming for you.

 

However, to put it in context, I went crazy because I'm still shielding (2yrs next month) because my elderly mother I care for around the clock is completely immuno-compromised and still waiting for her 4th covid jab. We won't be able to properly attend the funeral of my aunt tomorrow (the 4th family member to die of covid in the past 2yrs) but I'll drive her to the car park and we'll sit outside.

 

...But anyway, don't worry kiddies, nVidia stated last month that prices will come down in a year or so (maybe even as soon as this coming Autumn) as chip production & supply levels normalise - which hopefully won't affect me anyway as I'm not looking to pick up a gtx 1650 for at least another 5 years, maybe after I update to a skylake cpu (if I can bear to part with my old machine).

Edited February 11, 2022 by streetyson

[HeyYou]

Computer hardware advances fairly quickly. Generally, what is 'top of the line' today, is outdated within six months, and obsolete in a year. Of course, that doesn't mean it doesn't still work just fine, and play the games great. It just means there is something 'newer' out there. Games still have trouble taking advantage of more than two processor cores.... SLI/Crossfire have gone the way of the dodo, as the technology simply made it unnecessary. (not to mention, the cost/performance ratio just didn't make any sense at all.) I ran my last build for 8 years, with little upgrades here and there. The only reason I replaced it, was because it died. :) I expect my current build to last me a similar number of years. Games just aren't advancing as quickly as the tech to run them.