It is not a secret, the price of the Radeon RX 6000 has been inflated for a long time, and the same happens with the GeForce RTX 30 and, in general, with all the graphics cards that we can buy today. The problem is so serious that, as those of you who read us daily will remember, it has even ended up affecting the second-hand market, where the prices of graphics solutions with several years on top have skyrocketed to a ridiculous level.
Not long ago we saw what seemed to be a glimpse of a return to the path of normalization, but unfortunately it was a mirage, and right now everything seems to indicate that, in the short term, the situation can only get worse. The price of the Radeon RX 6000 has not stopped increasing in recent months, as a result of inflation and the impact that speculation and reselling are having, but according to VideoCardz the latest increase that has occurred comes directly from AMD itself .
Before anyone talks about opportunism and starts ranting, it is important that you understand why this price increase has occurred, and how much we are talking about. According to the source, the price of the Radeon RX 6000 has risen by 10% because AMD has to compensate for the increase in cost per wafer that TSMC has established, and that directly affects the 7nm node that the Sunnyvale company uses to manufacture such graphics solutions.
AMD’s main partners, including both OEMs and manufacturers, are already aware of this price increase for the Radeon RX 6000, and we know that it will be passed on to the consumer. with an increase of approximately between 20 and 50 euros, depending on the graphics card that we are going to buy. This means that the most “economical” models, such as the Radeon RX 6600 and Radeon RX 6600 XT, will suffer the least from this price increase, while the most affected models will be the most advanced.
The price of the Radeon RX 6000 goes up, but the Ryzen 5000 does not
It is a very curious thing, especially since both components use the TSMC 7nm node. What leads AMD to raise the price of the Radeon RX 6000 but to maintain that of its star processors? It’s a good question, and while we don’t have an official answer from the Sunnyvale company, I think it is quite clear what is happening.
The demand for graphics cards is huge, and many users are willing to pay anything to get a next-generation unit. This, coupled with speculation and resale, has turned the market in a real chaos, since the sale price of many models has tripled, and the figures that are paid are astronomical. With this outlook, it is clear that a rise of 20 or even 50 euros almost a “lesser evil.”
However, in the CPU sector the opposite is true. Intel has recently launched the Alder Lake-S processors, with them it has managed to regain the crown of single-wire performance, and the best thing is that it has done so while maintaining very attractive prices. I don’t speak for no reason Intel Core i5-12600K outperforms Ryzen 7 5800X in every way, and performs better in games than the Ryzen 9 5950X, and yet it is priced at just over 300 euros, while the two AMD chips cost, respectively, 379.89 euros (on temporary offer for Black Friday) and 769.90 euros (also on sale).
AMD has not raised the price of the Ryzen 5000 to compensate for the increase in costs per wafer because, plain and simple, he cannot afford it after the arrival of Alder Lake-S. For things like this I always repeat that, in the end, the main objective of companies is revenue, and that competition is essential to avoid harmful practices for the user.
