Monday, January 20th 2025
AMD's Radeon RX 9070 Launch Faces Pricing Hurdles
AMD's upcoming Radeon RX 9070 series graphics cards have hit an unexpected roadblock, according to recent reports from PC Games Hardware. Despite physical units already reaching select retailers, the launch appears to be delayed due to ongoing pricing negotiations. Industry insider and forum moderator "pokerclock," known for accurate predictions about NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 50 series, reveals that AMD's initial pricing strategy has created tension with retail partners. While boxes bearing the RX 9070 branding have been spotted in retail channels, disagreements over costs have prevented an official release. The core issue stems from AMD's aggressive pricing approach for both the RX 9070 and RX 9070 XT models. Retailers have pushed back against what they consider excessive wholesale costs, forcing AMD to reconsider its strategy.
The company now faces the complex task of potentially reducing prices while compensating retailers who have already purchased inventory at higher rates. Sources suggest AMD may offer marketing funds or cashback incentives to bridge the price gap, though negotiations have reportedly stalled. For example, we recently reported on the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT AIB model costing around $549. However, NVIDIA has announced its GeForce RTX 5070 at the same $549 price point, with potentially equal or higher raster, ray tracing, and AI capabilities across the board. For AMD to make the value case, the company would need to undercut NVIDIA's pricing. Until that is resolved, retailers aren't allowed to place RDNA 4 GPUs in general sale yet.
Sources:
PC Games Hardware, PCGH Forum, via VideoCardz
The company now faces the complex task of potentially reducing prices while compensating retailers who have already purchased inventory at higher rates. Sources suggest AMD may offer marketing funds or cashback incentives to bridge the price gap, though negotiations have reportedly stalled. For example, we recently reported on the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT AIB model costing around $549. However, NVIDIA has announced its GeForce RTX 5070 at the same $549 price point, with potentially equal or higher raster, ray tracing, and AI capabilities across the board. For AMD to make the value case, the company would need to undercut NVIDIA's pricing. Until that is resolved, retailers aren't allowed to place RDNA 4 GPUs in general sale yet.
175 Comments on AMD's Radeon RX 9070 Launch Faces Pricing Hurdles
If this story is true, retailers are arguing about selling it for less than 550 as they think that's too much...
Then It'll perform like a <550 ish card, very similar to what 7900gre sells for now...
Edit, found it: www.hotukdeals.com/deals/msi-geforce-rtx-4060-ti-8gb-ventus-2x-4294968Which part of "if they want to recover marketshare" did you miss?
IMO the initial impressions are correct, the 9070 is 7900GRE level, 7900xt at best.
I'm not sure how or what else AMD should do. The 7800xt is the same price as the 4060ti 16gb. The 7800xt slaps it down, but's getting outsold 30 to 1. Should AMD sale it for a loss? The 7700xt is the same price as the 4060, and it molests the 4060 up and down. Should AMD sale that at a loss too, even though Nvidia is outselling that also 30 to 1?
- the original VC article reads ~$600 with 12% VAT
- the member above said €529 with VAT, in Philippines (?); certainly not in Europe
- the original VC text predicts a range $549-749..
- do you see where this is going? Entire online jungle is placing their bets...
Allegedly this was 1 month ago with the 9070XT at around 305W
Shows a raster performance consistently well above the 4070Ti Super and by avg in the middle of 7900XT and 7900XTX (maybe closer to the XTX)
As of RT perf in CP2077 is 20% above the XTX at 4K with no FSR
...and it is +50% from XTX in Wukong at 4K, FSR performance (both GPUs)
If any of this is true its going to be very close to the 5070nonTi. Might even beat it in raster (as it beats 4070Ti Super) and be slightly under (5070) in RT, trade blows with 4070Ti Super.
If thats the case and with 5070 at $550 MSRP the 9070XT should be well below $500 ($450~480) in order to have some success.
- 9070XT should be far closer to Ti than to vanilla model
- 5070 will be sandwiched by 9070 and 9070XT
- but we will see how this goes in reviews
AMD has a real winner on its hands and realized that it priced too low.
AMD thought each tier of the 5xxx stack was going to see generational increases and it's looking like that isn't the case now.
So they want to jack up the pricing of their cards, but AIBs already bought the chips and retailers already bought the stock, so how do you charge them more for a product they've already purchased? And that is the rub AMD is trying to work through.
Otherwise RTX4080 Raster / 4070ti RT for $499 or $399 or whatever the rumored price was would be the deal of the God damn century and those cards would just perpetually be out of stock.
The 4060ti outsold the 7800xt, mostly, because the 7800xt was over half a year late to market. Same with the 7700xt. And with the 7700xt, AMD played the pricing game, putting it way too close to the 7800xt to make the 7800xt look better. That's entirely on AMD.