Nvidia has just released the RTX 4090 from the 4000 series, and the first exorbitant offers are already popping up on eBay and similar sites. However, those horrendous prices seem completely off, as it is said that some retailers are still receiving stock.
This is the current status:
- In September, Nvidia presented the new RTX 4080 and RTX 4090, the new flagships of the GeForce graphics cards.
- The new graphics cards were released yesterday, on October 12, and became available at 3 PM.
- Today, on October 13, the cards are already sold out in many places.
Why does the RTX 4090 cost so much? The release price of the new RTX cards was nearly 2,000 euros MSRP. Nvidia faced significant criticism for the high price, but the cards did not become cheaper at release.
As with the PlayStation 5, there was quickly a shortage of the new graphics cards, causing many retailers to run out of stock rapidly. Apparently, scalpers took advantage of this. “Scalpers” refers to users who deliberately buy products with predictable scarcity to resell them at a higher price.
In the case of the RTX 4090, Nvidia’s latest high-end card, GameStar colleagues discovered offers on the marketplace eBay ranging from 2,800 to 4,500 euros. That’s a steep price compared to the already hefty MSRP.
MeinMMO hardware editor Benedikt Schlotmann wonders if such graphics cards are really necessary:
Retailers are likely still being supplied
That’s why the price isn’t worth it: As the English website PCGamer reports, the prices of the scalpers are completely disproportionate – apart from the fact that they are outrageous anyway. Many retailers are not completely out of stock yet.
Only on October 13 did a retailer from the United Kingdom receive a new shipment of the RTX cards. However, this does not apply to all retailers. The tech chain Box is temporarily sold out and cannot say whether new shipments will arrive.
Nevertheless, PCGamer warns that it is indeed possible to obtain an RTX 4090 at MSRP. In Germany, Notebooksbilliger is the official retail partner of Nvidia, where the Founders Edition of the RTX cards is occasionally available at MSRP. Chains like Saturn and MediaMarkt are also good places to snag one of the new graphics cards.
The purchase of graphics cards by private individuals also carries risks, as a user recently found out:
