Nvidia has brought back its GTX 1050 series to resupply the low-end market

According to Tech YES City, an Australian Tech YouTuber, Nvidia has started to supply its hardware partners with GTX 10 series graphics cards to alleviate shortages within the low-end GPU market. 

Simply put, Nvidia cannot supply enough RTX 30 series graphics cards to meet demand, and cryptocurrency miners have inflated the cost of all modern graphics cards to ludicrous levels. This applies to both RTX 20 series and RTX 30 series products, as well as AMD’s RDNA and RDNA 2 GPUs. 

Thanks to their use of GDDR5 memory and 4GB or less of VRAM, Nvidia’s GTX 1050 series is both easy to produce and unsuitable for cryptocurrency mining. Ethereum mining requires more than 4GB of VRAM, and the GTX 1050 series’ use of GDDR5 memory allows the GTX 1050 series to be produced without competing for limited GDDR6/GDDR6X memory supplies. 

Today’s GPU market is so messed up that Nvidia’s GTX 1050 series offers good value to entry-level PC gamers, offering sub-£200 pricing and ample gaming performance for a lot of modern titles at 1080p. Cryptocurrency miners and scalpers have gobbled up most newer graphics cards with more VRAM, leaving PC gamers with few upgrade options.  

Until the cryptocurrency market settles, down and demand wanes, high-end graphics cards are unlikely to be readily available to the public at MSRP prices.  This is a reality of today’s market, especially as the value of cryptocurrencies like Ethereum continues to rise. 

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