Edited by Yujin Tchun
Graphics cards (GPUs), or also known as video cards or display cards, is a circuit board for computers that allow the rendering of images. This makes GPUs an essential part of computers (Johnson, 2021).
In 2021, there was a lack of supply of GPUs due to an ongoing shortage of silicon chips, and because semiconductors are mostly made with silicon, this created a huge shortage in the market. This was further worsened due to the pandemic, and the largest semiconductor manufacturers, such as Samsung, were forced to slow or completely halt production for a period of time. This, in tandem with the rising demand for consumer electronics like computers, gaming consoles, or VR headsets, has made it extremely difficult for manufacturers to keep up with demand (Vicente, 2022). This has resulted in GPUs prices inflating up to 120%, and making it increasingly hard to acquire a good quality one due to not only the shortage but also because of the increase in cryptocurrency mining (Schiesser, 2022), which has increased in popularity recently, as typically crypto mining would require multiple GPUs to perform(Vicente, 2022).
This shortage in silicon chips has also affected industries other than the GPU industry. As mentioned earlier gaming consoles such as the PS5 or Xbox also faced severe availability and major markups in price. Even Apple’s iPhone 12’s launch was delayed due to concerns regarding its stock availability (Vicente, 2022).
However, recently there are predictions that the prices of GPUs will see a major drop next month and hopefully return to their original prices by summer 2022, after 2 years of inflated prices and lack of supply. If this happens then we should see some GPUs such as the RTX 3080/3090 and the Radeon RX 6800 XT/6900 XT drop 20-30% of its manufacturer's suggested retail price (Areej, 2022). The other reason GPU prices may drop is that the two major GPU producers, NVIDIA and AMD, are going to launch a new generation of GPUs somewhere between July and September (James, 2022). This would in turn encourage vendors to try to sell their existing stockpiles as the demand for the newest gen GPUs increase (Areej, 2022). Although there are other factors that could change the trajectory of GPU supply and pricing, such as the lack of ABF substrate, which provides electrical insulation to many major components of computers (Ajinomoto, n/d) and there are some insecurities, many have high hopes for GPU prices to continue on the decline in the future.
References
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