At least some manufacturers have followed through on putting old GPUs back on the market again. Japanese vendor Kuroutoshikou has restarted sales of the GTX 1050 Ti, with a 4GB card retailing for 22,800 yen, or roughly $200. The card in question, the GF-GTX1050Ti-E4GB / SF / P2, originally sold for $140 when the GTX 1050 Ti launched in late 2016.
There are absolutely no new features, capabilities, or functions to report regarding the new card, which is reportedly manufactured by Palit. The GTX 1050 Ti offers gamers a chance to return to the halcyon days of 2016, when we were also (coincidentally) discussing an ongoing GPU shortage.
At the time, however, we were only chewing on AMD and Nvidia for launching cards they couldn’t ship for ordinary reasons, like low yields. Lower-end cards that were launching at the time, such as the RX 460 and GTX 1050 / 1050 Ti, were easier to find than their higher-end counterparts.
Last year, AMD and Nvidia offered tentative hope that the GPU market might stabilize as Q1 2021 drew to a close. Q1 2021 is officially drawing to a close, so take a moment to enjoy some of the better GPU deals you can currently purchase at Newegg. To those of you who don’t feel like clicking, a screenshot of current GTX 1050 Ti prices should tell the story well enough:
At $200, the Palit-built GTX 1050 Ti cards above would actually be a great value if they came to the US, where the cheapest card is currently $262. Under ordinary circumstances, we might expect high 1050 Ti prices at this point in time simply because the card is no longer manufactured, but that’s not what’s driving up prices. Even GPUs like the GeForce GT 1030, introduced at $80, are now selling for $140+.
Right now, your best bet for an economical graphics solution is to rely on CPU-based graphics. This is easier on Intel CPUs than AMD, because Intel offers an integrated GPU on all non-F CPUs, while AMD only offers a handful of APUs, and none equipped with either the Zen 2 or Zen 3 CPU architectures. There are no parts in-market currently selling at anything resemblant of a reasonable price and estimates for when market prices might approach a reasonable range from the end of Q2 to Q1 2022. We’re still hoping for the earlier part of that range, but no bets.
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