One of the controversies of recent days is that of NVIDIA RTX 4080 priceA, rivers of ink have flowed on the net, as well as a multitude of videos of experts whose slogan is the following: it’s too expensive. And all of this in such a coordinated and cohesive manner that it makes us suspicious, especially given that the release of AMD’s RX 7900 XTX is just a few weeks away. This makes us suspicious of the fact that many opinion makers have commercial and therefore economic ties with this or that brand.
However, the truth, although total, always requires a non-subjective point of view. In other words, since reality and experience are not common to all, we cannot draw the same conclusion. This is why we started to analyze the points of controversy and we decided to take into account other elements, not from the point of view of NVIDIA itself and nor of its competitors, but from ours, which is nevertheless that of a user on the foot
Is the price of the NVIDIA RTX 4080 too high?
What decides the price of a graphics card is its performance, if a model is made to have higher performance than another, it can end up surpassing it in price. However, the general concept is to maintain the price from generation to generation to give the end user the feeling that they are getting more for every dollar they pay. If we take the official launch prices of the latest NVIDIA generations, we will see that the price of the RTX 4080 is a bit high.
| Model | Price |
|---|---|
| GTX 1080 | 795 $ |
| RTX 2080 | 849 $ |
| RTX-3080 | 720$ |
| RTX4080 | 1549 $ |
For this price and in the absence of the release of the RX 7900 XTX, NVIDIA is competing, especially with the RTX 3090 Ti, which has a 24 GB GDDR6X configuration and was sold at the recommended price of 2,249 dollars and then plummets at 1329 dollars. And why are we talking about said graphics card? Well, due to the fact that the RTX 4080 outperforms it in performance, as you can see in the graph below these lines.
That is to say, the jump in power is such that NVIDIA cannot undersell it if we take into account the price list of its graphics cards. Putting the RTX 4080 at a lower price than a 3090 Ti which is still in stock and not cheap to manufacture, can mean millions in losses for NVIDIA and the rest of the assemblers, who should eat them. So from NVIDIA’s relative point of view, the cost of the card is adequate
El Ray Tracing Factor
Now, NVIDIA is not competing and the answer to the RTX 4080 is the RX 7900 XTX, the price of which is unknown in Europe. The RX 6900 XT came in at $1,300, so we should reasonably expect a price around that figure for an early December launch. Much lower than the NVIDIA RTX 4080, which it competes against.
However, there is one topic that no one is talking about and a thick veil is drawing over the scene and that is Ray Tracing. The RX 6000 had limited Ray Tracing, something we already informed you about at the time and the problem is that the evolution of this aspect in the RX 7000 has been poor.
To put you in context, in the parts exclusively responsible for ray tracing, NVIDIA has doubled down from generation to generation. AMD, on the other hand, launched the RX 6000 inferior to the RTX 20. The RX 7000? If we pay attention to the specifications, they are even below the RTX 30 in this regard.
We think if you’re buying a high-end graphics card, you’ll want to be able to play games in their graphical glory. Although the key question here is whether Ray Tracing will justify the price difference between the two cards. Some will say yes, others will say no. Obviously we know what the opinion of the fans of both brands is.
conclusion
One thing we really wonder is if NVIDIA’s mental market share will be enough to keep them making moves like this. What is clear is that the important thing here is how it compares to the RX 7900 XTX and whether it is only by brand that they will be able to justify the price difference. Believe it or not, it’s not the green brand that has to convince ordinary users, especially since it has 80% of the market. Rather, it is AMD that must know how to take advantage of the opportunity that its rival has provided. And we don’t say this to belittle the folks at Radeon Technology Group, but their path is more difficult than that of their rival.
AMD in graphics cards is currently in the same period as before the Zen era, which is why the RX 7000 and RDNA 3 are called “the Zen moment of graphics” with the aim of achieving the same as in the Ryzens. However, if this opportunity arises, it is because NVIDIA has skyrocketed with the price of the RTX 4080 on its own. If graphics card makers end up having higher demand for the competing model of the RTX 4080, then its price will have been challenged. If, in the end, all is talk and the situation does not change, we will continue on the upward path in terms of price, which is bad for us, the users.
