Nvidia's shift away from PC gaming wasn't driven by AI alone. Slowing GPU gains, rising manufacturing costs, and longer upgrade cycles made gamers a far less attractive business.
The Real Reason Nvidia Has Abandoned PC Gamers
- Thread starter Steve
- Start date
Nvidia has not abandoned gamers more than AMD really. Expensive RAM, increasing costs and consumers with thinner wallets in general, just means less focus, regardless of segment. Most consumers are not willing to pay what top fabrication procceses cost, and this will only get worse with next gen, using TSMC 2-3nm, hopefully by then, RAM prices have gone down.
We need more competition, Intel 18/14A, Samsung 2nm maybe TeraFab in a few years and more Asian companies. TSMC has pretty much monopoly.
Nvidia still has the better products and sell vastly more cards than AMD. So I don't see how they abandoned gamers. RTX 5000 is a meh generation, just like Radeon 9000. Stop gap solutions, re-using old and cheaper nodes.
Competition is great tho, so I am hoping for AMD to step in, and take advantage of this. If they truly care for gaming GPU market (which I sadly doubt they do), we will see when RDNA5/UDNA hits, how serious AMD is about this market.
AMDs biggest problem is they are limited by TSMC. They earn more on CPUs and APUs. AMD is CPU first. GPUs are 2nd. Gaming GPUs probabably 3rd or less. Margins are small, especially with current RAM pricing.
On a positive note, this means people builds will last longer. Especially if they have good upscaling support like DLSS 4 and FSR 4 - You won't see consoles or game developers pushing the envelope in the next 2-4 years.
We need more competition, Intel 18/14A, Samsung 2nm maybe TeraFab in a few years and more Asian companies. TSMC has pretty much monopoly.
Nvidia still has the better products and sell vastly more cards than AMD. So I don't see how they abandoned gamers. RTX 5000 is a meh generation, just like Radeon 9000. Stop gap solutions, re-using old and cheaper nodes.
Competition is great tho, so I am hoping for AMD to step in, and take advantage of this. If they truly care for gaming GPU market (which I sadly doubt they do), we will see when RDNA5/UDNA hits, how serious AMD is about this market.
AMDs biggest problem is they are limited by TSMC. They earn more on CPUs and APUs. AMD is CPU first. GPUs are 2nd. Gaming GPUs probabably 3rd or less. Margins are small, especially with current RAM pricing.
On a positive note, this means people builds will last longer. Especially if they have good upscaling support like DLSS 4 and FSR 4 - You won't see consoles or game developers pushing the envelope in the next 2-4 years.
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Lowhangingfruit
Posts: 111 +240
I actually think this will hurt consoles way more than PCs. PC gamers have a lot of options in both games and parts for upgrade. It's a much more dynamic space.
Consoles on the other hand rely on regular big releases. If the next gen console costs 3x as much to build and only offers 50% better performance, people will not upgrade. Console shoppers are much more price sensitive. I think the days of the old styles consoles are coming to an end. Too much competition from other devices.
The newest and most exciting innovation is in handhelds like the steam deck. That's a different platform that appeals to a lot to people that grew up with smartphones and ipads. The novelty factor might make people look past the sometimes unreasonably high price tag.
Consoles on the other hand rely on regular big releases. If the next gen console costs 3x as much to build and only offers 50% better performance, people will not upgrade. Console shoppers are much more price sensitive. I think the days of the old styles consoles are coming to an end. Too much competition from other devices.
The newest and most exciting innovation is in handhelds like the steam deck. That's a different platform that appeals to a lot to people that grew up with smartphones and ipads. The novelty factor might make people look past the sometimes unreasonably high price tag.
BlackyNoir
Posts: 44 +135
Not only did we realize it, but we said so several times right in your Youtube comments, pointing out the manufactured price hike, the silicon side upgrade to lock in their professional tech and to lock it in the gaming segment. It was the media who didn't realize it, and even said the opposite many times.
Steam Deck? Did not sell well, a few million units. Had one, sold it, slow and boring. Used it mostly for emulation of old consoles and PC games, many did not run that well. Hardware is very weak and FSR 4 is not supported, we need a Deck 2 Pro/OLED ASAP with FSR 4 support.
Nintendo Switch 1 + 2 on the other hand, handheld with close to 200 million units sold now, uses Nvidia chip and has DLSS support on Switch 2. Nvidia don't care about gaming? Why do they bother supplying Nintendo with chips? Like 80-85% of the gaming GPU market is Nvidia too.
But yeah, next gen consoles like PS6 was rumoured to get 32GB RAM (shared that is) and 2TB SSD, before price hike, now people expect it will be 20-24GB total and 500-1000GB SSD (again)
PS6 will probably launch in 2027-2028 regardless, just like PS5 (and PS3 actually) it might launch at a very high price. Slowly it will sell anyway and pricing will eventually go down, hopefully. If not, consoles will slowly die and people will turn to PC gaming - Next Xbox "console" is just a PC running Windows. Project Helix. Just like Steam Machine, which is just a PC running Linux (or Windows) and can be upgraded.
Consoles might die off if prices get too steep, and PC will take over. Handheld PCs are booming. You will see massive perf increases here going forward.
I agree with your stance, and my thoughts are very close.
I don't believe Nvidia has outright abandoned PC gamers, but I do think the company has clearly shifted its priorities. Twenty years ago, GeForce was the business. Today, GeForce is just one division inside a company whose primary growth engine is AI and datacenter hardware.
You can see that shift in pricing, product segmentation, VRAM decisions, marketing, and even where Nvidia spends most of its time and resources. Gaming products still matter, but they no longer appear to be the center of Nvidia's strategy. That's a very different situation than what many longtime PC gamers grew up with.
Where I think the article goes too far is in suggesting that Nvidia no longer cares about gaming at all. They still invest heavily in GeForce, DLSS, Reflex, driver development, and new GPU architectures. Gaming remains a massive business. It's just no longer the most important business.
Ironically, this creates an opportunity for AMD. Nvidia's focus on AI leaves room for AMD to compete more aggressively on value, and gaming focused products. AMD still has a stronger incentive to win over gamers because they haven't reached the point where AI revenue completely overshadows everything else.
So while I wouldn't say Nvidia has abandoned PC gamers, I do think the article correctly identifies a trend that has been building for years...gamers are no longer Nvidia's primary customer, and many of the company's decisions make a lot more sense once you accept that reality.
For the time being, Nividia does not have to innovate on consumer GPU's. That would be wasted R&D that will be spent elsewhere.
Any company would do that. Their goal is to make money.
AMD did the same in many segments, changed approach.
AMD invests heavily in enterprise GPU development. Massive focus.
In my eyes, Nvidia cares more about PC gaming than AMD. They have vastly better support of DLSS/DLAA, works closer with game developers (always have launch ready drivers) etc. AMD had so many oppotunities and did not take them.
This generation, AMD cancelled the bigger RDNA 4 SKUs which would have delivered alot of competition, all we got was 9070 XT that don't even beat 5070 Ti. Another lost oppotunity.
Neither Nvidia or AMD spends much R&D money on gaming and poor consumers. They want to focus on Enterprise, where the big money lies. AMD would love to get some of those AI billions that Nvidia gets. This is logical. Business 101.
AMD 100% rather want succes in the enterprise GPU segment than the gaming segment. Little magins here, especially for AMD. AMD GPU are not selling well, unless cheap. That is AMDs biggest problem.
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Oh for ****s sake. Is tech spot really so desperate for revenue that they have taken to doomposting?
Nvidia has not stopped making GeForce cards
Nvidia has not stopped development of future generations
Nvidia has not stopped driver development.
Nvidia has not abandoned anything.
Steve, your article is bad and you should feel bad.
Nvidia has not stopped making GeForce cards
Nvidia has not stopped development of future generations
Nvidia has not stopped driver development.
Nvidia has not abandoned anything.
Steve, your article is bad and you should feel bad.
Steam deck has almost 70% of the handheld PC market, I want to know the mental gymnastics you used to come to your conclusion that it didn't sell well. The market might not be huge, but it dominated the market it created. There are better handhelds, but they cost as much as legitimate gaming laptop, thermal throttle like crazy and have battery life issues because of the hardware you use. People look at the steam deck and only look at performance numbers. I hate to tell people this, but those performance numbers don't matter if the battery doesn't last long enough to make your first save.
The switch 2 didn't sell well because it's the better hand held. Most users actually keep it docked like a console. It sold well because Nintendo hordes it's IP. They didn't buy a switch because it was better, though bought it because it's the only way to play Mario Kart, Zelda and Pokemon.
nVidia has been vibe coding their drivers for about the last year and it's starting to show. Oddly, their Linux support has gone up in quakity but that's because, well, AI. Most locally hosted models are run in some version of Linux
Thatsdisgusting
Posts: 510 +591
Frankly speaking I've never figured 3060Ti as a "gem" - maybe it's just retrospective thoughts inspired by GT4050 aka "RTX4060"? OFC that thing would never rival midtier GA104 with given AD107, even with help of miraculous TSMC 5nm.
I thought 3080 was more of a "gift", when nvidia tear flagship GA102 from itsheart for a "mere" 700$.
I thought 3080 was more of a "gift", when nvidia tear flagship GA102 from its
It is clear that Nvidia wants to reduce the amount of silicon delivered to each tier of customer. Frame generation and DLSS5 should help in that regard. Neural texture compression helps to reduce the need for memory bandwith and size.
But moreover, despite critics speaking of latency issues, Nvidia's wet dream is cutting out the middle man (board makers), reuse the same (limited) silicon for multiple customers, and get a recurring income from gamers. They want GeforceNOW to become the standard. PC's and consoles will then just be terminals. And Nvidia will also have more control over the gaming market: which games are available, under which conditions, which technologies are used, how things will look (DLSS5)... It may take some time and will perhaps require new networking tech, but Jensen is slowly trying to get there.
But moreover, despite critics speaking of latency issues, Nvidia's wet dream is cutting out the middle man (board makers), reuse the same (limited) silicon for multiple customers, and get a recurring income from gamers. They want GeforceNOW to become the standard. PC's and consoles will then just be terminals. And Nvidia will also have more control over the gaming market: which games are available, under which conditions, which technologies are used, how things will look (DLSS5)... It may take some time and will perhaps require new networking tech, but Jensen is slowly trying to get there.
In my opinion, the reason for this circular financing is quite clear, and that's because it benefits the senior leadership since they are awarded with company shares, board members and shareholders. It may be true that Nvidia may be finding it harder to maintain their margins selling GPUs that are also getting more complex and expensive, but you can say the same thing with their AI chips. Every single generation of AI hardware is basically pulling substantially more power to deliver the extra performance in some areas. But the margin is high, so they can continue to keep this going longer. However. It's obvious this AI master race BS is not sustainable since cost is also going up exponentially to produce these AI hardware and companies buying them have limited resources. These hardware are subjected to depreciation, meaning your million bucks rack will be worth nothing by x number of years in the balance sheet. If you are not making enough money to cover the cost of buying, maintaining and depreciation, the party will be over sooner or later.
This has nothing to do with the subject at hand.
What a conspiracy theory!
They want to use the same silicon? No way! Did you just come from 1997? That's not some devious plot, that's being smart. Why develop and build two different sets of silicon with the same tech? It's a waste of resources.
Cloud gaming has been "around the corner" for 20 years now. Until you break the laws of physics, the latency issues and service problems will always limit it to a curiosity or an accessible layer for those with little disposable income.
They are trying to shrink the dies to keep the cards affordable. Have you seen the price of a single wafer from TSMC? Since gamers cry and fill their diapers if you try to charge more then $500 for a GPU they have to find some way to make cards fit into small budgets. Big dies are not affordable for that purpose. The big GPUs will continue to be big, because every time we hear this "oh noes they not making big GPUs no mo!" they release a new xx9x tier card.
Use the same silicon as in: put a chip in a server and let it's capacity be used by multiple GeforceNOW users at the same time or serially...
What skimping on dies of discrete cards is concerned - what you just mention: note that the price increase of cards is only partly justified by a higher BOM cost. Nvidia has been taking higher margins than before.
Assumption Fail 1:
Comparing 500 USD products over the course of 15+ year timespan while obviously ignoring the hefty inflation (actually over 50% from 2010 until today) alongside
Assumption Fail 2:
Overexaggerated relevance of performance gains per generation and time between generations (while some people might buy a new GPU when it has atleast X% more performance than their current, many buy for other reasons or just update on a regular time frame)
Also, the essence of the article is not
„It's not exactly a fun time to be a PC gamer“ because gaming on PC is great with all the recently introduced technologies and an atleast ok-ish availability on pretty much every hardware… its more like „It's not exactly a fun time being poor“
On a side note:
If you invested 500 USD in NV stock back in June 2010 (instead of buying that 500 USD NV GPU) that would have been about 2000 shares. Current price for those 2000 shares is about 420000 USD.
Comparing 500 USD products over the course of 15+ year timespan while obviously ignoring the hefty inflation (actually over 50% from 2010 until today) alongside
Assumption Fail 2:
Overexaggerated relevance of performance gains per generation and time between generations (while some people might buy a new GPU when it has atleast X% more performance than their current, many buy for other reasons or just update on a regular time frame)
Also, the essence of the article is not
„It's not exactly a fun time to be a PC gamer“ because gaming on PC is great with all the recently introduced technologies and an atleast ok-ish availability on pretty much every hardware… its more like „It's not exactly a fun time being poor“
On a side note:
If you invested 500 USD in NV stock back in June 2010 (instead of buying that 500 USD NV GPU) that would have been about 2000 shares. Current price for those 2000 shares is about 420000 USD.
Neatfeatguy
Posts: 2,266 +4,569
I think the feature that supports Steve’s thesis and which continually gets understated in these comments is that there is a supply constraint in chip production.
If you have a fixed manufacturing capacity at any given moment in time, the intelligent business will prioritize the most profitable and in demand products (AI related at the moment) and not less profitable areas like enthusiast GPU production.
That enthusiast market is, by definition, one in which the buyers will tend to pay more because of their passion for this “hobby”.
So when posters are talking about AMD should “take advantage” or some other entrant come into the gpu market to fill the supply/demand gap they forget that there simply isn’t the capacity that would allow them to fill it.
And even if there were the other components, particularly ram, have increased at time of writing by a factor of about 5x.
At some point supply will improve either through more manufacturing capacity being created or perhaps the AI demand dropping significantly, freeing up capacity that already exists.
nvidia (and AMD) would probably be thrilled to make more GPU sales but not at the expense of more profitable AI. And I suspect they are basically able to sell whatever they do manufacture currently.
In that sense, they don’t care about “you” (the enthusiast) because while “you” will moan and complain you’ll still find the extra money somewhere even if it means looking under your pizza sauce stained sofa cushions for the extra cash.
If you have a fixed manufacturing capacity at any given moment in time, the intelligent business will prioritize the most profitable and in demand products (AI related at the moment) and not less profitable areas like enthusiast GPU production.
That enthusiast market is, by definition, one in which the buyers will tend to pay more because of their passion for this “hobby”.
So when posters are talking about AMD should “take advantage” or some other entrant come into the gpu market to fill the supply/demand gap they forget that there simply isn’t the capacity that would allow them to fill it.
And even if there were the other components, particularly ram, have increased at time of writing by a factor of about 5x.
At some point supply will improve either through more manufacturing capacity being created or perhaps the AI demand dropping significantly, freeing up capacity that already exists.
nvidia (and AMD) would probably be thrilled to make more GPU sales but not at the expense of more profitable AI. And I suspect they are basically able to sell whatever they do manufacture currently.
In that sense, they don’t care about “you” (the enthusiast) because while “you” will moan and complain you’ll still find the extra money somewhere even if it means looking under your pizza sauce stained sofa cushions for the extra cash.
This is not some conspiracy or something, it's simply the reality of transitors. We need simply more companies and sources of wafers. We need China to catch up on that tech to be an alternative and competitor. I hope for Huawei and others to catch up or find better ways to create transitors. Asml basically is the ONLY company in the world that produces these machines. And because of ****ing america and American companies we have this mess. We need someone to come up with a competitive alternative. If anyone can, the Chinese can and they will. Only matter of time. I can't wait.
Vibe coded drivers have a lot to do with Nvidia no longer caring about the gaming GPU market as they once did.
Nvidia doesn't have to completely abandon the market, just stop caring about it enough which they've done already with drivers causing crashes or fans to stop working, hiking prices to the point of cards being out of reach for much of the PC gaming market that historically had $250-300 x60 class cards. In addition to that they've done nothing to fix the melting power connector, which shouldn't have been allowed to enter the market, now partner brands are trying to come up with band aid fixes for a fire hazard.
Ray tracing is something that still can't be done cost effectively for the GPU's a majority of people buy, because Nvidia wants to keep their margins extremely high, also while Nvidia has resorted to selling consumers on playing games upscaled from 720P to achieve having wet floors and extra shiny environmental objects.
Games used to look better before Nvidia pushed game publishers to use RT, and before devs got lazy using Unreal Engine instead of an in house optimized game engine.
Nvidia doesn't have to completely abandon the market, just stop caring about it enough which they've done already with drivers causing crashes or fans to stop working, hiking prices to the point of cards being out of reach for much of the PC gaming market that historically had $250-300 x60 class cards. In addition to that they've done nothing to fix the melting power connector, which shouldn't have been allowed to enter the market, now partner brands are trying to come up with band aid fixes for a fire hazard.
Ray tracing is something that still can't be done cost effectively for the GPU's a majority of people buy, because Nvidia wants to keep their margins extremely high, also while Nvidia has resorted to selling consumers on playing games upscaled from 720P to achieve having wet floors and extra shiny environmental objects.
Games used to look better before Nvidia pushed game publishers to use RT, and before devs got lazy using Unreal Engine instead of an in house optimized game engine.
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You want the Cronenberg graphics we have today?
axiomatic13
Posts: 1,199 +1,876
How do I say this politely. You are wrong and cherry picking or not able to see the differences.
If you are not able to see the massive difference pathtracing does and still wanna tell me that games looked better years ago, then you are having a eye vision disability I would assume or are trolling.
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