Im in a similar situation to Senpai. I need a specific kind of card because of size limitations in my case and I would prefer an exhaust style or a shorter card with an open back plate.
Because of this, Ive been trying since Nov 2020 to get a card, starting with the 3060Ti FE. Along the way there have been a few times I could have picked up a card at rrp, but in all cases they were too big for my case...
I also tried for the 3070Ti FE. I didnt even want it, because it was right on the edge of size for me and I didnt like the heat profile as I prefer a lower power card. Tried anyway, but didnt even see a button.
As time went on, the price I considered resonable for a mid-tier card crept higher and higher. At the start I didnt want to pay more than £400, then it became 500, then 6, then 650. Even raising my budget didnt help, I still couldnt get anything as stock sold out in seconds.
Ive been hunting for a rrp card for over 6 months now and I have kind of resigned myself to not getting a card for at least a year or so. I will just switch to playing strategy games and avoid FPS I guess.
One the most annoying things about this shortage that you dont hear mentioned often is that buyers dont really have choice anymore. You can no longer look at the different cards and choose the one which best suits your needs, size or price or colour, fan headers, dual bios, customer service etc etc. Buyers just dont have time to think, if it is in stock then buy it. This is ok for scalpers and the rich, but for people that dont drop £500 every year on a new card and rather spend as little as possible and keep their cards for 4+ yrs this is a very bad market
3060s are in stock at OC as I write this and start at £599 and go up into the mid-600s. I was around when the 3060s first dropped on OC (25 Mar). They started around £450 and I passed at the time because that pricing was more than a 2060Super cost at the end of 2019. Back in 2019 I considered the 2060Super pricing too high and passed... So there is no chance Im going to shell out £150 over the already over inflated prices. Next drop the price will probabaly go up again. Some people must have money to burn paying these prices, or they are all just being bought by scalpers/miners which the tech press keep telling us is exagerated and it is actually normal gamers paying these prices too?
NB: Im not having a go at OC specifically, all the retailers have inflated prices now
I was watching a Paul's hardware video yesterday where he mentioned an old video of his 'Build a new gaming PC for $500' and how that is impossible now. There are also several videos published recently discussing if this is the end PC building. Of course it will carry on, but if building a mid-tier gaming PC permanently becomes 2, 3, 4 times the price it was a couple of years back, it will be quite an elite hobby (even though it was a tiny bit already). There is always the 2nd hand market, but for some they dont want to get their hands dirty with dealing with items that have no warranty or possibly getting scammed. Even if this inflated demand goes away, I very much doubt the 40 series cards will have resonable RRPs. All mining will have to go away or cards will have to be crippled for all mining, neither of which I think is likely. Sadly, I think this situation is here to stay - at least for a few years until something in the architechure changes where the gpu isnt so important anymore.
