Nvidia Sold $175 Million Worth of GeForce RTX 30 GPUs To Crypto Miners

[StDragon]

1 hour ago, leadeater said:

However I do think a lot more people are getting in to gaming due to the pandemic so the market itself has grown.

According to an article from npd.com, that is correct.

 

Quote

"Year-over-year growth for participation, time and money spent on gaming has been significant among less traditional gaming segments as well, notably adults over 45 years of age. Time spent gaming for those between the ages of 45 and 54 saw an increase of 59%, while dollar spend increased 76%. Gamers ages 55 to 64 increased time and money spent by 48% and 73%, respectively; and those 65 and older increased time and money spent on gaming by 45% and 29%, respectively.

 

For many consumers, this increased engagement with games is likely to be part of a general increase in digital activities and device usage with gamers also reporting increases in their online activities, including social media and streaming platform usage.

 

Although investment in the gaming category is up, overall time/money spent on other forms of entertainment for this audience is generally down. This is driven, for the most part, by COVID-19 restrictions, which have significantly impacted access to key categories like live events and dining out." -npd.com

 

[Bombastinator]

32 minutes ago, Nacht said:

I don't wanna life anymore.........

Yea you do.

[Fnige]

[aisle9]

On 11/30/2020 at 3:45 PM, Master Delta Chief said:

First of all, there's nothing that needs to be agreed upon. It's simple, mining needs to end, period. Your comparison has no relevance in this particular debate as those two are different things and circumstances. I know that capitalism is pretty much at fault here as the system allows it to happen, but that doesn't mean that because of that we can't put restrictions in place for scalpers. One of the reasons there is a market in place for scalpers is simply because consumers have no other choice but to buy from those types of people if stock in regular stores are empty or worse are at higher prices because of that. In order to prevent that from happening, governments should regulate stores to restrict sales of these solely towards the regular consumer by either putting a limit by how much can be sold or by other potential solutions that I can't come up with right now. 

 

And for the record, this isn't about entitlement whatsoever. I know the issues that I have mentioned go way beyond this original topic of the thread, but are related. 

Wowee zowee.

 

For one, mining applications (particularly blockchain) have already contributed far more to society than gaming ever has, and are continuing to contribute more than your ability to play Whinecraft at 16K ever will.

 

Two, you're advocating market controls on GPUs. Market controls are typically employed to make sure that, for example, gas isn't $20/gallon while a hurricane is approaching. They're there to make sure that everyone has a fair shot at essential items (and they kinda failed there...). They're not there to make sure that you can play Whinecraft at 16K instead of "your" GPU being sold to someone who's going to use it to combine its power with others to advance science, to fold, or to redefine currency. You know, someone who's going to better society with it?

 

If a retailer wants to put a limit on how many of a certain item can be bought by a certain person, go for it. I completely support retailers doing that. It is not, has never been, and never shall be the place of any government say, "NVIDIA, you can't sell RTX 3080s to 'scalpers' because Little Master Privilege wants to play Whinecraft in 16K, and he wants to play it now."

[Master Delta Chief]

1 hour ago, aisle9 said:

Wowee zowee.

 

For one, mining applications (particularly blockchain) have already contributed far more to society than gaming ever has, and are continuing to contribute more than your ability to play Whinecraft at 16K ever will.

 

Two, you're advocating market controls on GPUs. Market controls are typically employed to make sure that, for example, gas isn't $20/gallon while a hurricane is approaching. They're there to make sure that everyone has a fair shot at essential items (and they kinda failed there...). They're not there to make sure that you can play Whinecraft at 16K instead of "your" GPU being sold to someone who's going to use it to combine its power with others to advance science, to fold, or to redefine currency. You know, someone who's going to better society with it?

 

If a retailer wants to put a limit on how many of a certain item can be bought by a certain person, go for it. I completely support retailers doing that. It is not, has never been, and never shall be the place of any government say, "NVIDIA, you can't sell RTX 3080s to 'scalpers' because Little Master Privilege wants to play Whinecraft in 16K, and he wants to play it now."

It's funny that certain individuals like you seem to assume that I say gaming should gain priority over anything, but let me tell you, you're wrong. I am criticizing mining for different reasons unlike some in this thread that don't make a proper argument on as to why mining is a bad thing. Gaming isn't the sole importance on getting a GPU, there are many other applications that are pretty important. I will say though that gaming has a much larger influence than you might think, still that doesn't mean it should gain priority. 

 

Unfortunately as you and I know, retailers are reluctant to implement certain restrictions as it basically makes cash for them, hence why I mentioned a government should step in. Whether such control ever comes in place, only time will tell.  

[Grabhanem]

I think most people here are looking at this from a flawed angle.

 

Nvidia doesn't sell individual cards aside from FEs. They fulfill orders from third parties for GPUs, who then assemble the cards.

 

Let's say Nvidia gets an order from Asus, an order from Gigabyte, and an order from a boardmaker who specializes in mining. They can't just say to the mining mfr, "we don't like your style, so we won't fulfill your order so we can send all these GPUs to your competitors" without losing a lot of important industry ties. And a lot of gaming partners make mining cards as well, so they couldn't just say "all GPUs you sell must be marketed for gaming" in the contract-- AIB partners have left Nvidia in the past, and they wouldn't want to risk getting abandoned by their best customers. EVGA makes mining cards; imagine the number of people who would change sides in the GPU war if EVGA went AMD only like XFX did a few years ago.

 

Is this move bad for their rep among gamers? Yes, but you all want the cards anyway, so they don't care. Is it kinda disingenuous? Yea, but again, you all want the cards anyway. Will it matter long term? Probably not.

[Rune]

Meh. Is what it is. They make money either way. 

[Bombastinator]

3 hours ago, aisle9 said:

Wowee zowee.

 

For one, mining applications (particularly blockchain) have already contributed far more to society than gaming ever has, and are continuing to contribute more than your ability to play Whinecraft at 16K ever will.

 

Two, you're advocating market controls on GPUs. Market controls are typically employed to make sure that, for example, gas isn't $20/gallon while a hurricane is approaching. They're there to make sure that everyone has a fair shot at essential items (and they kinda failed there...). They're not there to make sure that you can play Whinecraft at 16K instead of "your" GPU being sold to someone who's going to use it to combine its power with others to advance science, to fold, or to redefine currency. You know, someone who's going to better society with it?

 

If a retailer wants to put a limit on how many of a certain item can be bought by a certain person, go for it. I completely support retailers doing that. It is not, has never been, and never shall be the place of any government say, "NVIDIA, you can't sell RTX 3080s to 'scalpers' because Little Master Privilege wants to play Whinecraft in 16K, and he wants to play it now."

Putting the cart before the horse.  Blockchain did not come out of mining, mining came out of blockchain. Blockchain was developed for bank communication.   Dont try to take credit where credit is not due. Also remember video games go back over 40 years.  Before PONG. You really want to put mining against ALL of that? All the people who redeveloped hand eye coordination after strokes or surgeons who practiced, or virtual surgery or any number of things that provably did come out of graphics technology?  Heck we can even throw blockchain in as part of mining and it’s still a walkover. 

[Kisai]

2 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

Putting the cart before the horse.  Blockchain did not come out of mining, mining came out of blockchain. Blockchain was developed for bank communication.   Dont try to take credit where credit is not due. Also remember video games go back over 40 years.  Before PONG. You really want to put mining against ALL of that? All the people who redeveloped hand eye coordination after strokes or surgeons who practiced, or virtual surgery or any number of things that provably did come out of graphics technology?  Heck we can even throw blockchain in as part of mining and it’s still a walkover. 

I think this is steering the topic far off. All GPU's were first intended for business use, and still are (CAD/CAM, Gaming, Engineering, and Film/Television.) The next use after that is consumer use, and consumers get the slightly cheaper, cut down versions of the business model. You don't really want precision errors engineering (not that GPU's are being used that way.)

 

Miners, if it was just about recycling dies that are unusable for GPU use, there would be no complaint, because those parts would never find their way into GPU's, or at least you'd think that. But then you'll notice the GT parts exist and wonder why these PCIe 1x parts are even being made. But as it turns out, yes these 1-lane parts are being made explicitly for mining/folding, because they don't require the PCIe bandwidth at all. It does appear that these are "defective" or "binned" cards in a way as parts are disabled on them that would otherwise work.

 

 

Now if it was just about reusing parts that otherwise would just be destroyed, yeah, we shouldn't be complaining. But that's not the problem here. The problem here is that scalpers and miners are competing for the exact same gaming cards the gaming customers want, because they want to be the first to have them. If you're not in a rush for an upgrade, you can quite literately skip this generation, and wait for the next generation, as the the upgrade landrush and the miners will have already been satisfied. That's what I think nVidia flubbed with the 20xx parts, they released these parts at a price point that only made sense for mining rigs, and then had to backtrack and make the 1660 to save face that the RT tech was immature.

 

[Dracarris]

10 hours ago, aisle9 said:

For one, mining applications (particularly blockchain) have already contributed far more to society than gaming ever has

This is just so utterly wrong and simply an insult to anyone working as a GPU, game or CAD developer. As I have pointed out earlier, gaming has been almost the sole driver for the enormous GPU development and advances we've seen over the last decades (before GPGPUs became a thing).

[Moonzy]

in the end, it's not about what's better for humanity or whatever, i doubt nvidia cares, even if you think they should

 

it's who can bring out the cash, or strike the deal first

[MageTank]

26 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

This is just so utterly wrong and simply an insult to anyone working as a GPU, game or CAD developer. As I have pointed out earlier, gaming has been almost the sole driver for the enormous GPU development and advances we've seen over the last decades (before GPGPUs became a thing).

I think you missed his point entirely. His point was not that mining advanced the development of GPU technology more than gaming, but rather mining has contributed more to society in terms of scientific contribution (curecoin being an example) compared to gamings contributions. I disagree with his statement, but I figured I'd clarify on his behalf to avoid further confusion.

 

Contributions to society should not be viewed strictly from a viewpoint of advancements in medicines or technology. Gaming as a medium has changed how we view entertainment and has made significant cultural advancements in our society. Modern gaming has changed the way we interact with one another quite substantially. If you told your ancestors a few decades ago that you were playing a game with someone half way across the world in Germany while you were from the US, they'd think you were crazy. 

 

I still think the hate towards miners is unwarranted. They are paying customers like the rest of us. You can convince yourself that it's "unfair" that they are buying multiple GPU's to mine with, but if they are willing to pay that investment, I see no harm in them doing so. The issue you people have with bots, I completely understand, however that is not the fault of miners, but rather the fault of retailers failing to combat against them. As for scalpers, they are taking advantage of the high demand. It sucks, but that's capitalism at work. As long as someone is willing to pay, they'll continue to scalp.

 

It's not fun, but this is likely going to be the new normal for quite some time, at least for the foreseeable future.

[Dracarris]

4 minutes ago, MageTank said:

I think you missed his point entirely. His point was not that mining advanced the development of GPU technology more than gaming, but rather mining has contributed more to society in terms of scientific contribution (curecoin being an example) compared to gamings contributions. I disagree with his statement, but I figured I'd clarify on his behalf to avoid further confusion.

Well gaming advanced GPU technology which in itself is a huge contribution to society and science. And even leaving this out of the picture, all the algorithms and knowledge that resulted from decades of game engine development probably has as well a much higher weight than what mining has.

7 minutes ago, MageTank said:

Contributions to society should not be viewed strictly from a viewpoint of advancements in medicines or technology. Gaming as a medium has changed how we view entertainment and has made significant cultural advancements in our society. Modern gaming has changed the way we interact with one another quite substantially. If you told your ancestors a few decades ago that you were playing a game with someone half way across the world in Germany while you were from the US, they'd think you were crazy.

Yep.

[DeScruff]

I'll say this like I always do with mining.
Shame and its a waste. Only cause mining does literally nothing to help. All that horsepower is going to...? Generate random garbage numbers that mean absolutely nothing at the end of the day. Its not calculating cancer research, quantum mechanics, weather forecasts, molecular mechanics. Or the next digit in Pi, heck its not even used to entertain someone.

The more and more I think about crypto miners, the more I get reminded of bot goldfarm networks in MMOs. Automated systems taking away resources to generate virtual currency that will be exchanged for real currency/goods. Nobody likes goldfamers in MMOs. Why do they get a pass in real life?

[Moonzy]

4 minutes ago, DeScruff said:

heck its not even used to entertain someone.

mining as a hobby is a thing (one of mine)

and it feeds families (not me)

and pay for my computer upgrades (as much as someone else doesnt want to admit that gpu mining isnt profitable, yet every time a gpu launch miners still buy them)

[DeScruff]

10 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

mining as a hobby is a thing (one of mine)

and it feeds families (not me)

and pay for my computer upgrades (as much as someone else doesnt want to admit that gpu mining isnt profitable, yet every time a gpu launch miners still buy them)

Your entertained by the numbers that crypto is generating? _{(If so I highly recommend a random number generator =P )}
Or are you just entertained by what crypto mining brings and how much your hardware can do such a task?
Would crypto be less entertaining if was calculating... I dunno a frame of the next CG movie or something else, something else where the numbers have actual meaning.

[SpaceGhostC2C]

8 minutes ago, DeScruff said:

Your entertained by the numbers that crypto is generating? _{(If so I highly recommend a random number generator =P )}
Or are you just entertained by what crypto mining brings and how much your hardware can do such a task?
Would crypto be less entertaining if was calculating... I dunno a frame of the next CG movie or something else, something else where the numbers have actual meaning.

I don't find mining interesting myself, but there's also people whose favorite game is Cinebench. They could also be rendering a frame of the next CG movie, but they are rendering the same image over and over instead, often at very low levels of energy efficiency, to see if their latest hundred-dollar custom loop tweak shaved some Celsius somewhere.

From my perspective, to each its own, as long as they internalize any cost generated by their activity. That requires well-functioning markets and market failure corrections. If so, whatever you do with your stuff, you are adequately compensating society for removing said stuff from an alternative use, and choosing to do so because you find it more valuable than what you are paying for it.

 

With that in mind, there are a number of potential issues manifesting themselves in scalping and mining; however, they are very different, even opposite at times, of what people in these threads typically point out. With a majority of users coming from proud market economies, I'm really curious on what views people actually hold with respect to markets as a resource allocation mechanism, and how contradictory those views can get. However, that would become off-topic in a half off-topic discussion, so I'll have to delay my inquiry until finding a suitable place for it.

[Moonzy]

19 minutes ago, DeScruff said:

Your entertained by the numbers that crypto is generating?

i find it fun to explore hardware's capability and i learnt a lot while mining

and earning my computer's next upgrade is kinda fun

 

20 minutes ago, DeScruff said:

Would crypto be less entertaining if was calculating... I dunno a frame of the next CG movie or something else, something else where the numbers have actual meaning.

that would be a tough question to answer, as i have a niche hobby to begin with

[MageTank]

40 minutes ago, DeScruff said:

I'll say this like I always do with mining.
Shame and its a waste. Only cause mining does literally nothing to help. All that horsepower is going to...? Generate random garbage numbers that mean absolutely nothing at the end of the day. Its not calculating cancer research, quantum mechanics, weather forecasts, molecular mechanics. Or the next digit in Pi, heck its not even used to entertain someone.

The more and more I think about crypto miners, the more I get reminded of bot goldfarm networks in MMOs. Automated systems taking away resources to generate virtual currency that will be exchanged for real currency/goods. Nobody likes goldfamers in MMOs. Why do they get a pass in real life?

You can equate this entire argument to gaming though, with the exception of the entertainment aspect (which is entirely subjective). I know plenty of parents that complain about their kids wasting their time gaming, worrying that they'll amount to nothing because "all they do is sit in front of those games all day". As for "not calculating cancer research", there are endeavors such as Curecoin making claims to the contrary, though I myself have not investigated those claims to determine if they hold any water, but it's not impossible either.

 

20 minutes ago, DeScruff said:

Your entertained by the numbers that crypto is generating? _{(If so I highly recommend a random number generator =P )}
Or are you just entertained by what crypto mining brings and how much your hardware can do such a task?
Would crypto be less entertaining if was calculating... I dunno a frame of the next CG movie or something else, something else where the numbers have actual meaning.

I won't speak for being entertained by numbers that crypto is generating as I am not a miner, but I am entertained by the benchmarking results achieved from my memory overclocking. The task is often considered pointless and mundane by 90% of the people on this forum, yet I enjoy it as a means of relaxation and entertainment. We all have our own individual interests. Whether we understand each others is irrelevant.

[Dracarris]

44 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

and earning my computer's next upgrade is kinda fun

Weren't you the guy that refused to factor in the cost of electricity for those "earned" upgrades?

42 minutes ago, MageTank said:

I won't speak for being entertained by numbers that crypto is generating as I am not a miner, but I am entertained by the benchmarking results achieved from my memory overclocking. The task is often considered pointless and mundane by 90% of the people on this forum, yet I enjoy it as a means of relaxation and entertainment. We all have our own individual interests. Whether we understand each others is irrelevant.

The big difference between mining and all these OC hobbies: OC hobbyists run their systems only at full blow when they actually engage with them, during their spare time. Miners run their rigs basically 24/7 at full blast, wasting much higher levels of energy (and in fact most of the time don't even get a net financial positive outcome).

[Moonzy]

2 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

Weren't you the guy that refused to factor in the cost of electricity for those "earned" upgrades?

yes im, because i don't see why i need to share my work with a stranger online

at no benefit to myself, in a selfish miner afterall c':

[Dracarris]

4 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

yes im, because i don't see why i need to share my work with a stranger online

at no benefit to myself, in a selfish miner afterall c':

When you claim publicly online that you get a net profit from mining, you have to back that claim up and not all the sudden go "none of your bussines" when the situation gets uncomfortable for you and the claim is challenged. Backing up the claim will in no way share any of your "work" (running mining jobs) with strangers.

 

The fact that you consistently refuse to even answer whether you have factored in electricity cost or not speaks a very clear language.

[Blademaster91]

10 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

Weren't you the guy that refused to factor in the cost of electricity for those "earned" upgrades?

The only way mining makes sense as a hobby is if power is free, as mining 24/7 could easily add $30 to a power bill.

10 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

The big difference between mining and all these OC hobbies: OC hobbyists run their systems only at full blow when they actually engage with them, during their spare time. Miners run their rigs basically 24/7 at full blast, wasting much higher levels of energy (and in fact most of the time don't even get a net financial positive outcome).

Some miners set a lower power limit so the card isn't running at full power all the time, though its still way more wasteful than a few hours a day of gaming, and a card running constantly is still more wear and tear on the card. I won't buy a used card because who knows if someone mined with it and wore out the fans.

[Moonzy]

5 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

you have to back that claim up

right, because people are bulk buying GPU to mine because it's not profitable, makes sense

i guess im losing money then, too bad -sigh-

 

 

Edited December 2, 2020 by Moonzy
also, online hashing calculators exists, just key in your own bill and check it for yourself

[Dracarris]

1 minute ago, Moonzy said:

right, because people are bulk buying GPU to mine because it's not profitable, makes sense

i guess im losing money then, too bad -sigh-

They are running them in bulk at specific places that are hand-picked for ultra-low electricity cost. This is completely different (although still stupid) from average Joe Does like you running 1 or 2 cards in their personal rigs at home.