Hardware is becoming increasingly expensive. The Vice President of AMD has now promised to keep prices affordable. In Germany, the most popular graphics cards from AMD are available at least at the MSRP. However, whether this will remain the case is questionable.
Hardware is getting more expensive, especially RAM, but SSDs and graphics cards are also affected to some extent. Some graphics cards, such as the RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 are hardly or not at all available.
The Gizmodo magazine spoke with David McAfee, Vice President of AMD and responsible for Ryzen, on the sidelines of CES 2026. When asked about the rising prices of PC hardware, McAfee stated that they are working with various board partners to prevent prices from rising further.
AMD aims to ensure that graphics cards remain affordable
McAfee stated: McAfee, Vice President of AMD, explained that they have had significant partnerships with DRAM producers for many years. DRAM is important for graphics cards. This way, they aim to prevent prices from rising for graphics cards as well:
We have maintained very strategic partnerships with all DRAM manufacturers for many, many years to ensure that both the supply volume we need and the economics of our purchases align with our graphics business.
He added that AMD is trying to work with board manufacturers to keep prices close to AMD’s recommended prices.
Without memory at the right price, it’s difficult to develop graphics cards that hit the right price and market together with our AIB partners. Therefore, very precise management of this memory ecosystem is an absolutely central part of our work.
In Germany, you can currently get AMD’s key graphics cards at MSRP or below
What does the current situation look like? AMD’s currently most important graphics cards are the RX 9070 XT and the RX 9070. In addition, there are the smaller models from the 9060 series. If you look at the prices on Geizhals.de, the prices are currently indeed slightly below or at MSRP.
The RX 9070 XT has an MSRP of 689 Euros, but you can already get the graphics card for 650 Euros. The same goes for the RX 9070: The MSRP is 629 Euros, but you can already get the graphics card for around 600 Euros.
By the way, Nvidia is similar: The MSRP for the comparable RTX 5070 is 589 Euros, and you can partly get the graphics card at or slightly below MSRP.
However, how long prices will remain like this is another question. There are already rumors (via Videocardz.com) that AMD is planning to slightly adjust the MSRP of its graphics cards due to rising costs: It’s said to be 20 or 30 Euros per card. In Germany, there’s no sign of these price adjustments yet, but in other countries, there have been price adjustments (via Reddit.com).
RAM has become really expensive. Some users are going so far as to buy 18-year-old hardware: DDR3 RAM and compatible processors are significantly cheaper. Retailers report that sales of old hardware have reportedly risen rapidly: Users are currently buying 18-year-old hardware out of desperation because modern RAM is just too expensive
