cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

How To Get a RTX 3080/3090 Practical Advice (Updated 22/09/20)

Shadowmask72
Honored Visionary
OK fellow consumers and friends. I've been well-invested in this 3080 launch debacle, probably more than most since I already sold my RTX 2080 Ti so I'm now using an i9 9900K integrated graphics, GeForce Now, PS4 and Xbox Cloud Gaming for my kicks. 

As you may or may not know, Nvidia have acted pretty naively with the 3080 launch considering they should have expected bots and scalpers to take all the stock, and high demand after their own hype. However, thankfully they are revoking suspicious orders manually. You can see a stock checker for Digital River (European handlers) which seems to be rising hourly because this process obviously takes time.

The issue now then is how does Nvidia move forwards in announcing stock availability? They surely can't expect people to sit on their website and press F5 all day. How do they prevent the bots from taking all the stock again? In their statement, they did mention emails being sent out when stock becomes available, however faith in that system seems low considering the email notifications for the launch were sent out 1 hour after the launch time previously, by which time the stock was long gone. Perhaps then this will be the only way to buy from them via the email link so make sure you sign-up to be notified.

There's some reason to be encouraged though. Nvidia are looking into ways to prevent bot/scalper purchases even if adding a captcha to the store front. But bots can pass those checks, so I hope they figure something else out. Either way, I expect a 3080 relaunch in the coming days rather than them trickling out stock. How they handle it though is anyone's guess. Some retailers are taking pre-orders now but in a queue system, so you can take the gamble of pre-ordering now and waiting your turn. It could be weeks or months though. There's light at the end of the tunnel, as Nvidia is resupplying vendors daily. Yes, that's right, "daily" using their own words. This is encouraging then and means the wait might not be as long as you think. 

My advice though moving forwards then and especially if you are after a 3090 next week is to not put all your faith in getting the Founder's Edition cards and go for an aftermarket version. There is decidedly less interest in the 3090 though from my research, but stock levels are likely to be much less than the 3080. The problem I see with the Nvidia website is I think stock will naturally be extremely limited so even if you're not competing with Bots, your competing with like-minded consumers en-mass. I also don't believe Nvidia will have a tangible solution to the bot/scalper issue by next-week (but they have said they've improved things in a recent update to the store). Sure, it's easy to code re-captcha into a store-front but I am not confident this method can eliminate bots entirely. There is also no guarantee that their website won't "break" again like it did yesterday.

In my experience monitoring the 3080 launch, I found that alternative retailers offered the best chance of securing cards. Several hours after launch I saw pre-orders open for next day, and even a couple of cards in stock.  Some might suggest it's prudent to have more than one store page open in your browser. This might help. Getting alerts might help as well. There are several sites which offer this

Either way, the bottom line is Nvidia wants your business and if the bots/scalpers get them all, then the negative press shrouds them, so it's not a case of they are happy because they got the money anyway. There's enough legitimate customers to buy all the stock, and I would wager they prefer that and moving forwards against AMD who are poised to announce their own wares at the start and end of October. Now, some folks might want to wait for that and then make an informed choice (depending on the RX 6000 series specs). 

Also this is day one. Expect things to level-out over the coming weeks. Sure, the supply chains have been affected by COVID-19, but manufacturing still continues and there's plentiful resources available to large companies such as Nvidia.  Some people are concerned they won't have a new card for the release of Cyberpunk 2077. That's one of this year's most anticipated titles (and showcased during the 30 series reveal). I strongly believe that by the game's November 19th launch there will be plenty 30 series cards available. So a bit of patience will calm your nerves.  Also, word is that a greater amount of inventory will be available in October.

- Keep an eye on EVGA Jason's Twitter feed as he seems to announce when EVGA have stock US or EVGA have stock EUR. They are getting new drops every few days I believe. They are also manually reviewing orders and cancelling bot orders.


Happy Hunting.


System Specs: MSI NVIDIA RTX 4090 , i5 13700K CPU, 32GB DDR 4 RAM, Win 11 64 Bit OS.
34 REPLIES 34

Digikid1
Consultant
I said it once, I said it twice, and I will keep saying it.....

People need to learn to WAIT AND SEE WHAT HAPPENS.  This happens almost every time when something comes out and they then complain because it doesn't work.  Sure it can be fixed by software updates about 70% of the time but that other 30% is when it is a hardware issue that requires you to send it back and wait....and wait....and wait.

Patience is a good thing.


falken76
Expert Consultant

RuneSR2 said:


Mradr said:

Whats funny is that they will be releasing TI/Super cards later on 😛 soo all this madness over a card that is going to replace even sooner by something better.


Maybe, the average Joe might just know of 3080 and 3090 - and of course 16GB and 20GB aren't official versions yet. Some who have bought 3080 10GB may be surprised and sad that they did not wait for 3080 20GB, who knows - as many may not be able to afford selling and upgrading from 10GB to 20GB soon. It might be a good idea to choose wisely and not to panic 😉



The ram is so expensive, that card will be nowhere near $699 with 20gb, if it's $1,400 I wouldn't be buying that for sure.  When will we need 20 gb of vram?  I think I can get by the next 5 years or so on 10 gb.

hoppingbunny123
Rising Star
i wish they added people to email lists then sent the email a link to buy 1 guaranteed then the emails would have to be isp verified 1 per email.

falken76
Expert Consultant
Well apparently the Steve Jobs wannabe from Nvidia said it's unlikely you'll get a 3080 or 3090 card before 2021 now.  Due to unprecedented demand during the corona virus.  Hell, with UI paying out $3,600 a month thanks to PUA and the pandemic, these opportunists signed up with bot companies like Bounce Alerts and spent that money buying up these cards and hawking them on ebay.  There is a large portion of this "demand" coming from the opportunist that don't even know what the card is, just that it is a hot product that bounce alert says you can make a killing on.  The idiots paying the scalper are using THEIR $3,600 they collected from UI to pay for those cards, what's the difference you didn't work for the money anyway.  Where else is everyone suddenly getting so much money they can waste on a video card in the midst of a pandemic where most are furloughed?  2020 is FUCKED!  I wish I got fired so I could collect money hand over fist on Unemployment, instead I have to take the damn calls and watch these liars get paid hand over fist while I get fisted by the government on my paycheck that pales in comparison to 1 week of their UI with all these programs going.

pyroth309
Visionary

falken76 said:

Well apparently the Steve Jobs wannabe from Nvidia said it's unlikely you'll get a 3080 or 3090 card before 2021 now.  Due to unprecedented demand during the corona virus.  Hell, with UI paying out $3,600 a month thanks to PUA and the pandemic, these opportunists signed up with bot companies like Bounce Alerts and spent that money buying up these cards and hawking them on ebay.  There is a large portion of this "demand" coming from the opportunist that don't even know what the card is, just that it is a hot product that bounce alert says you can make a killing on.  The idiots paying the scalper are using THEIR $3,600 they collected from UI to pay for those cards, what's the difference you didn't work for the money anyway.  Where else is everyone suddenly getting so much money they can waste on a video card in the midst of a pandemic where most are furloughed?  2020 is FUCKED!  I wish I got fired so I could collect money hand over fist on Unemployment, instead I have to take the damn calls and watch these liars get paid hand over fist while I get fisted by the government on my paycheck that pales in comparison to 1 week of their UI with all these programs going.



Well he's not saying anything that isn't already obvious. They can't produce enough cards for everyone in 2 months. The demand is too high and it's hard to produce those chips. They're selling out instantly.
The 3070 will be produced in bigger numbers compared to the 3080 or 3090 but I have a feeling a lot of would be 3080 buyers are going to settle for 3070's and it's going to sell out too.. The AMD card should also be around the ballpark of a 3070 so there's that.

But yea, it's a shame how many people are paying scalped prices. It just encourages scalpers to continue. I see people paying double mostly, but some as high as $3800 for a damn 3080.

Then there's this listing where a guy sold a drawing of a 3080 and some poor sap paid 955 euros. I doubt he intended to do that.