Falling GPU prices are thing of "the past", Nvidia says
After complaints surrounding GeForce RTX 40-Series pricing.
Earlier this week, Nvidia announced its next series of GeForce RTX cards - and raised eyebrows at how much some of them will cost.
At the top end, the RTX 4090 will cost an eye-watering $1599. The RTX 4080 16GB will cost $1199, while the RTX 4080 12GB will cost $899.
Many had hoped for lower prices - but, according to Nvidia boss Jensen Huang, these costs reflect a world where Moore's law - where performance is doubled for half the price every two years - is now "dead".
"Moore's Law is dead," Huang said, as reported by Digital Trends. "A 12-inch wafer is a lot more expensive today. The idea that the chip is going to go down in price is a story of the past."
That said, Nvidia has had plenty to boast about with the 40-Series range. The 4090 and 4080 are the first GPUs from the company's 'Ada Lovelace' series, and should be up to twice as fast as their last-gen counterparts in rasterised games - and up to four times as fast in ray-traced games.
The company's RTX 3080 also remains available.
"The RTX 4080 16GB is 3x the performance of the RTX 3080 Ti on next gen content like Cyberpunk with RT Overdrive mode or Racer RTX - for the same price," an Nvidia spokesperson told Eurogamer today. "And the RTX 4080 12GB is 3x the performance of the RTX 3080 12GB for $100 less.
"They are a fantastic value relative to similarly priced RTX 3080 GPUs. However we know that the RTX 3080 10GB is an incredible value and we'll continue to offer it."
For more on RTX 4090, Digital Foundry is already hands-on with Nvidia's new cards.