NVIDIA asks retailers to sell to gamers first

With cryptocurrency mining profitability remaining at all-time highs, video cards from AMD and NVIDIA are selling out like hot cakes as miners buy up all the inventory. The result is that gamers once again have a lot of trouble to get a video card, and have to cough up prices that can be over double as high as the recommended retail price.

Some retailers are now offering GeForce cards with certain limits, like a maximum of two cards per customer. German tech site ComputerBase reports this measure was implemented at the request of NVIDIA. The site received a statement from NVIDIA spokesperson Boris Böhles, which clarifies that NVIDIA wants gamers to come first:

" For NVIDIA, gamers come first. All activities related to our GeForce product line are targeted at our main audience. To ensure that GeForce gamers continue to have good GeForce graphics card availability in the current situation, we recommend that our trading partners make the appropriate arrangements to meet gamers' needs as usual. "

NVIDIA stresses that this is just a recommendation, the company can't and will not intervene in the freedom and independence of trade.

Whether NVIDIA's request has a major impact is unknown. It may help to prevent orders in the three-digit order of magnitude from miners, but the problem doesn't reside exclusively at the retail level. The larger miners (and their suppliers) buy cards straight from the factory, and screw on custom coolers.