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Crypto and Bitcoin miners are driving up the cost of VR

Zenbane
MVP
MVP
Came across an interesting article that notes the impact the Miners are having on the "cost of entry for Virtual Reality."

Basically, the Miners are buying up all the high-end Graphics Cards. In doing so, the cost of these cards is increasing. However, these are the same cards that are often required to create a machine to power an Oculus Rift or HTC Vive. Especially if you want to meet the graphic demands of something like Fallout 4.

The price range for a 1070 or 1080 is between $800 and $1,000. The price increase is the natural result of Supply/Demand, however, it certainly doesn't help make the case in favor of "affordable PCVR." Especially when VR Titles demand the higher end Graphics Cards for a "quality experience."

Cryptocurrency and Bitcoin were some the biggest sensations in 2017. We saw normal people become millionaires overnight due to the crazy growth and demand of crytocurrency. And with the explosion of cryptocurrency came the overhaul of crypto-miners that started to buy out all the GPUs on the market. Due to the demand for GPUs, the entry cost into PC based VR systems is now a lot higher.

When Nvidia first announced the GTX 1070 and 1080, they were priced around $379 – $600. Some thought this was pretty expensive for a graphics card. Now, if you check any eCommerce or marketplace like Amazon, you’ll notice how expensive these graphics cards are now.

While current minimum specs for the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive allow you to use GPUs such as a GTX 1060, demanding games like Fallout 4 VR state that you need at least a GTX 1070. But even then, a GTX 1060 costs almost $400.

https://www.vrandfun.com/bitcoin-miners-driving-vr-entry-prices/

55 REPLIES 55

... that's just an add I keep seeing when visiting.... erm... recreational websites. I don't think there's any mining involved 

Syrellaris
Rising Star


... that's just an add I keep seeing when visiting.... erm... recreational websites. I don't think there's any mining involved 



well if you do 10 or so Porn shoots for 100 a shoot a day, that would be 1000 a day!

Anonymous
Not applicable


Cryptocurrency is a bubble that will collapse at some point, it is a non sustainable money source. Got to admit to, it is the biggest scam people fell for. 


and dont get me started about RAM prices .. If i were to buy 32 GB again, id pay almost 3 times for it now!



Ram prices are up mainly due to smartphones though and well pure greed.



Cryptocurrencies aren't going anywhere. People have been saying it's a bubble and harping on about tulips for YEARS. How long before this isn't a bubble? People have been saying it's a bubble since 2011, I think it was The Economist saying it back then. That was just over 6 years ago. 😮

RorschachPhoeni
Trustee
HODL
Excuse my bad english. I speak to you through the google translator. 😛

MowTin
Expert Trustee

snowdog said:



Cryptocurrency is a bubble that will collapse at some point, it is a non sustainable money source. Got to admit to, it is the biggest scam people fell for. 


and dont get me started about RAM prices .. If i were to buy 32 GB again, id pay almost 3 times for it now!



Ram prices are up mainly due to smartphones though and well pure greed.



Cryptocurrencies aren't going anywhere. People have been saying it's a bubble and harping on about tulips for YEARS. How long before this isn't a bubble? People have been saying it's a bubble since 2011, I think it was The Economist saying it back then. That was just over 6 years ago. 😮

I should do gamers a favor and invest in cryptocurrencies because the moment I invest is the moment the bubble will burst 🙂

I thought that with technology the more demand for something the cheaper it became due to lower manufacturing costs as supply catches up with demand. In the long run, this will cause other manufacturers to start making high-end video cars and they'll compete at margins and higher volumes. 

In the long run, the market should adjust leading to cheaper cards. It's also important the computing power needed to produce cryptocurrencies increase faster than the computing power needed to render VR. 
i7 9700k 3090 rtx   CV1, Rift-S, Index, G2

Anonymous
Not applicable
I remember when this came out and when we started working on code to use the GPUs over the CPUs. It's scary now to see that from then really causing problems right now xD

Either way, it's not stable enough to really be functional enough to take over real money but unfortunately it is stable enough that people are going to do it short term to make "free" money if people continue to buy and sale like it is stock. Unless something comes in and really mess it up/burst the bubble - then you get stuff like this. There are a few ways to cause this and one of them is happening already - people are not taking these things as real cash for a product or service anymore. As this slowly redacts it self - the less and less value the value of the stock becomes. This is already happening in some degree with steam and other vendors not taking it as money anymore.

Another thing that is coming in the future is hardware design to mainly mine these things instead. This will remove GPUs from the factor and will help decrease the value of 2nd/1st hand cards for a short while. In some ways - this is going to shoot GPU makers in the foot and this is what they are worried about once this happens. Why will this happen? Because design hardware will be able to do many more hashes per watt than a general design card will. This sounds great for miners until they increase the number of hashes a person has to do produce per watt resulting in video cards not doing as well as custom design hardware could.

The major design flaw is that they also use up "cheap" power. This is going to hurt us at some point meaning power prices are going to explode once we run out of that. There has been talk already in major cities of charging almost double once  you hit over a given power limit.

Syrellaris
Rising Star

snowdog said:



Cryptocurrency is a bubble that will collapse at some point, it is a non sustainable money source. Got to admit to, it is the biggest scam people fell for. 


and dont get me started about RAM prices .. If i were to buy 32 GB again, id pay almost 3 times for it now!



Ram prices are up mainly due to smartphones though and well pure greed.



Cryptocurrencies aren't going anywhere. People have been saying it's a bubble and harping on about tulips for YEARS. How long before this isn't a bubble? People have been saying it's a bubble since 2011, I think it was The Economist saying it back then. That was just over 6 years ago. 😮


So its a long lasting bubble, that ain't nothing new. Think is it is increasing power draw in second and third rate countries, even first rate countries like the west are having issues with it. Governments are currently thinking about making it illegal, china will be the possible first to do so.

Companies are starting to no longer accept them and well, banks can just say no to paying out as well.

It's a bubble, it will pop at some point.

BeastyBaiter
Superstar
It's a bubble much like the dotcom bubble of the late '90's early 2000's. The basic idea of cryptocurrency is sound, serves a purpose and a demand exists for it (which I expect to grow dramatically). It isn't going anywhere. But it's still a bubble that will pop at some point.

Zenbane
MVP
MVP

Side note: We need more Bubbles in VR.

In fact, I'd like to ride a bubble in VR.



hoppingbunny123
Rising Star
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZlDpQpC2pM

The bitcoin gpu rush will last through cv2. Ruin the vr till cv3, then asics will stop the gpu rush. Bitcoin won't pop.