I think far and away the biggest problem with Nvidia is that their naming scheme makes zero actual sense. If they would maintain price brackets with GPU names many of us would be way more tolerant of price increases. I used to spend 300-400$ on a new GPU and so would buy the xx70 series cards. I bought the 970 for about 300-350$ and the 1070ti for 450$ just before the market went insane due to crypto. Right at the edge of crypto I bought a 1080ti for 750$ (and paid for it with mining while idle). Since then I've sold my 80ti class card to fund the next upgrade. the 20xx series cards are when Nvidia blew up the name/pricing connection though. The 2080ti should have been 700-800$ and instead was 1200$, a 50% price premium! That made the 2080 the card that replaced the 1080ti price bracket and it was a sad 10-20% performance boost best case (ignoring DLSS/RTX which was crap at the 20xx release).
So I skipped the 20xx class cards and when Nvidia announced the 30xx series cards and their prices I immediately sold my 1080ti the same day on ebay for 600$. I ordered a evga 3080FTW for 770$ from evga direct and got super lucky and got one right away in the first 3 weeks. The 3080 was a huge leap over the 1080ti and a substantial leap over the 2080ti. So it looked to all of us GPU buyers as if Nvidia had decided that the xx80 series cards were going to be the new 700$ price bracket with the new xx90 series cards taking over for the 80ti/titan class cards in price and performance.
Now the 40xx series cards have arrived and we have the 20xx series all over again, except this time the cards do actually have a decent performance improvement within price bracket and nvidia has gone and screwed with the names again. The 4070ti seems to compete in roughly the same price bracket as the 3080(10gb)-3080(12gb) or 700-800$ range. It seems to range from a 12-25% performance uplift over the 3080 (10-12GB) cards at similar MSRPs.
The 4080 seems to slot into the same price bracket as the 3080ti (1199$ MSRP) with a 22-30% performance uplift. The only thing I can guess is that they are screwing with the naming to try and make the cards look like a larger uplift in performance then they really are at a FPS/$ level. And it seems to work since I almost never see reviews comparing cards across MSRP price brackets, instead the dutifully jump on the companies propaganda train and compare the 1080 with the 2080 and 2080 with 3080 and 3080 with 4080 instead of comparing what you actually get for the price you spend.
I mean how many of us choose our video cards based on the name of the card? I'd assume most of us are like me and have a specific budget or performance level we are aiming for and we look at cards in that particular price bracket. 600-700$ is my new max price bracket and so the 4070ti slots right in there. But its 20-25% best case performance boost simply isn't enough to warrant an upgrade, especially considering how well the 3080 still handles pretty much everything.
I think Nvidia's current pricing is an attempt to capture as much of the market into the very top end of the scale (4090 with the 4080 being the "poor mans" top end) and trying to avoid even offering anything in the 500-700$ range that seems to sell the best to a good chunk of enthusiasts. I think their also trying to not crater sales of their 30xx cards they still have in large quantities as well.
I also think we probably need to get used to this cycle of boom and bust with GPUs. Nvidia felt they under priced their cards with the 30 series but what really happened (other then crypto and a big influx of bored gamers who couldn't go to live events) is that they had created a bubble with the terrible value of the 20xx series cards. The 30xx series were so good and priced so well that not only were they a good upgrade for 9xx and 10xx series owners, they were also a excellent upgrade for 20xx series owners wanting to step up a level or two in their price bracket (from a 2060 to a 3070 or 3080 for example).
Now with the 40xx series cards they released them with a good uplift but prices that only worked during massive shortages and intense demand.
The 50xx series cards will likely be the upgrade point for most of us 30xx owners. The question of course will be if they try and maintain the 20xx/40xx pricing or if they once again jump back into the 10xx/30xx pricing that moves huge volumes?
Why cant Nvidia just stay consistent with their naming scheme for at least a few years!?
