The hunt for a graphics card at its intended price feels increasingly like a phantom chase. For many, securing a card at the manufacturer’s suggested retail price—the MSRP—is not just difficult, it’s often entirely out of reach. Now, unsettling reports suggest that even the MSRP itself may soon become a meaningless figure, particularly for Nvidia products.
Roman Hartung, a respected German tech YouTuber known as “der8auer,” has been closely monitoring the graphics card market for years. As CEO of Thermal Grizzly, a performance cooling supplier, Hartung possesses deep industry knowledge and recently revealed a concerning shift within Nvidia’s operations.
Hartung’s reporting centers on a program Nvidia allegedly used to incentivize its add-in board (AIB) partners—companies like Asus and Gigabyte—to sell a limited number of cards at MSRP. While these cards always represented a small fraction of total sales, the program provided a crucial lifeline for consumers seeking fair pricing. However, Hartung claims this program, potentially called “OPP” or “Open Price Program,” has been discontinued, based on information from two industry sources.
The dynamics of retail pricing are complex, involving discounts, rebates, and agreements between manufacturers and retailers. Nvidia’s program aimed to counteract inflated prices by offering financial incentives for cards sold at the announced MSRP. Though independent verification remains elusive, the existence of such a program aligns with the observed trends within the GPU market over the past decade.
Currently, the industry is facing unprecedented turmoil. Memory prices are skyrocketing, impacting the cost of crucial components sourced from companies like Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix. Simultaneously, demand for GPUs and memory is being driven to extremes by the booming “AI” data center sector.
Rumors are circulating about Nvidia potentially canceling consumer-grade cards, particularly those offering substantial RAM at relatively affordable prices, such as the 16GB RTX 5060 Ti and 5070 Ti. Supplies are dwindling rapidly, creating a fertile ground for scalpers to exploit the situation and reap substantial profits.
Hartung anticipates a strategic shift in Nvidia’s production, prioritizing the higher-margin RTX 5080. Even this card, however, is expected to see a significant price increase—potentially 40 to 50 percent—before scalpers even enter the fray, as the more desirable 5070 Ti and 5090 become increasingly scarce.
While these claims remain unconfirmed, Nvidia’s prioritization of its limited resources towards the more lucrative AI sector appears logical. This leaves everyday consumers facing a bleak outlook if they hope to acquire recent gaming hardware, or even general computing components, at reasonable prices.
