Market monopolies/ duopolies/oligopolies are never good nor for business nor for R&D. There is solution for that, it's called mandatory splitting up of a company by antitrust legislation. Monopolies should be crushed like Standard Oil, International Harvester and American Tobacco were back in 1850s.
Which would accomplish nothing .... all they would do is split it up into Gaming Cards / Professional cards / AI subsidiaries.
There's few entities you can blame for current pricing:
1. Corporations are required by law to provide the maximum return to their shareholders. And while this does not allow for skirting laws, breaking laws or other nefarious activities, corporate managing boards can be charged with fiscal malfeasance if they don't maximize shareholder value. No corporation in the world worries about whether you can afford their product, the only thing they care about is if units are moving off the shelves as fast as they can make them. To think that there's any corporation on the planet who behaves otherwise is naive. So no basis for blame here.
2. Companies failure to predict rise and fall of crypto market. NVidia found themselves unable to meet demand with the rise of crypto and then rushed significant units into production only to have the market collapse leaving them with excess inventory. Until that is gone or reduced to a level where it can be written off, the price of 2xxx cards will be artificially bumped up to make the 1xxx cards look like attarctive alternatives. Until we stop seeing 2xx seeries cards "sold out" on web sites nothing will change here. So who can we blame here ? With the consumers who are shelling out more money than is wise. As long as the are leaving the shelves faster than they can make them, nothing will change here.
3. AMD fans were dancing in the streets when AMD "stole" the console market and when they did the folks in the nVidia boardroom were smiling and rubbing their hands together. They had been down that road and regretted it. Deciding not to aggressively compete for this market was likely the most significant decision they ever made. I'm sure they made a show if it, if for nothing else than to make sure AMD rtaised their bid. After having "been there" they started losing ground to AMD as nVidia was spending too much money for too little return and their discreet card business started losing ground. By winning, AMD lost as meeting console obligations leeched too much talent and focus from the discrete card division and AMD started tanking in that arena. With each successive generation, AMD lost control of another market tier.
While everyone talks about the 970 as what a card should cost, I look at it as a predatory pricing move against AMD to cripple their most profitable market niche. I think someone stood up in the board room and said "Yes, we are taking a bold risk here, if we sell the typical number of x70s at this price we will never cover R&D and tooling costs, but if we can take the 3rd tier market from AMD and steal those sales we will cover those costs w/ the extra sales and drive a financial stake into AMD. Yes,pure supposition on my part but not illogical at all given the 20/20 hindsight we now have. We all know what happened next, the 970 sold 2+ times more units than all AMD 2xx and 3xx cards combined. Now it's extremely hard to make a case for AMD in the top 4 tiers (1060 thru 1080 Ti) when considering all factors; the 2xxx series is just serving as a cash cow with exorbitant prices going to folks with money to burn just so they can have the latest and greatest. Once the excess inventory is sold, we can expect prices to drop, tho if they can be sustained for any significant periods, not as much as one might expect. Two groups get blame / credit here ... the guys in the boardroom who decided that the console market really wasn't worth pursuing aggressively and the guys in the boardroom who decided it was.
4. Whether real or imagined, there's a mindset at least here in the US that cost increases are due in part to tariffs. Washing machines / dryers, TV sets and such are up 15-20% in stores. Im sure most have seen these numbers with regard to current 10% tariffs impact ...
- RTX 2080 Ti Gaming X Trio: $1231 to $1310
- RTX 2080 Ti DUKE 11G OC: $1212 to $1290
- RTX 2080 Ti VENTUS 11G OC: $1203 to $1280
- RTX 2080 Gaming X Trio: $849 to $900
- RTX 2080 DUKE 8G OC: $840 to $890
- RTX 2080 VENTUS 8G OC: $830 to $880
It would appear some is being passed on to customer and some is being absorbed, at least for the time being .... what happens when the tariffs jump to 30% again after the holidays is unknown.
With the cost of the top nVidia (x80) card having hovered around $700 on average since the year 2000 In 2017 dollars..... So with current inflation, $700 in 2017 should be $730. Given the RTX add on and lack of anything comparable as competition, I expected + $75 to $100 which gives a reasonable MSRP of $805 to $830 which lines up with the above pretty well ... $855 to $880 w/ tariiffs. Now normally, we wouldn't see a Ti available till say May or so. In recent generations, when AMD introduced the competition to nVidias top card, they would drop the Ti a week later. So if you are willing to pay an extra $400, and obviously many are, you can have next year's Ti card now. My guess is, nVidia's betting that there will be no match to the 2080 so thay don't need to keep the Ti on the shelf ready to "steal the buzz".
What we have here is a marketplace that is in control of pricing but they just don't wanna wait. Don't like the price, gather up a modicum of patience, make an adult decision and chill.
