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Comment by delecti | Hacker News Reader

Graphics cards have ranged across the price spectrum for the past 20 years. The first GeForce "Titan" card was $1000 and came out right in the middle of that time range (2013). I'm not sure what PC market you were watching for the past 20 years, but it's not the one I remember.

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Titan was the most premium card available and probably not representative of a typical build.

Sure, but it also remains the defining example of "ludicrously expensive graphics card". The card below it, the GTX 780, was $650, which is still more expensive than any current generation consoles. Meanwhile the current top and 2nd tier GeForce cards (3090 and 3080) have MSRPs of $1500 and $700, which are more expensive, but not outrageously so. I just don't think it's accurate to paint a picture of the market from 2008-2017 as affordable in contrast with the current expensive market.

In 2013 you could drop to the mid-tier GTX 770 for $399 and get more performance either Xbox one or PS4.

I don't think you are wrong, just more lenient in your definition of affordable. It is compounded by the supply constraints, and markups over retail we are currently seeing. I can buy a 3090 right now on amazon, but it is $2,450, 5x the console price. Titan was ~2x console price.

Titan MSRP is $1,499; unfortunately the only units for sale on Amazon are from scalpers.

MSRP doesn't matter anymore. These cards are so difficult to get that they basically go used for MSRP, and on the secondary market for nearly a multiple of MSRP.

As are the modern cards that cost $1000. You can spend significantly less that that and still play all the modern titles at high settings and 1080p60fps easily. (Or 4k if you're willing to make the same compromises on framerate that consoles do)

The minimum card you need to play current games on 1080p/60fps/high settings is about a GTX 1070, a four-year-old card which goes for $300 used. Remember we're comparing this to the cost of using a game streaming service.

Obviously at least over the short term the streaming service ends up cheaper (although with stadia charging for games it depends on how many you buy and how much more they are there than on steam, especially with sales). I was just calling out the implication that the standard price for a GPU that runs modern titles well was more than a current gen console, it's not.

(Amusingly I'm running the exact card you mentioned, and I did buy it for about $450 NZD used, although the going rate is more like $350 now on the local used market).

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