Recap: AMD launched the Radeon RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT last Tuesday and all their regular board partners participated, bar one. MSI was conspicuously absent and has almost entirely ignored the new generation, prompting fans to ask when the company plans on releasing its custom designs for the GPUs.

MSI has hardly acknowledged the two new AMD GPUs despite them being on the calendar for more than a month. Its website still hasn't been updated and continues to proudly advertise the 6950 XT. MSI's only comment on the new generation is a retweet of an AMD promotional video with a caption saying that the GPUs will be available soon.

Define "soon."

As the rumors started to swell last week, Andreas Schilling from HardwareLuxx.de shared his understanding that MSI was waiting until next year to unveil its custom cards. He says that MSI has chosen not to use any AMD reference designs this generation, including the standard reference design that AMD encourages all its board partners to resell with their logos slapped on the side. MSI has sold reference designs like that in the past.

It's strange that MSI is so far behind. It's often one of the first companies to share pictures of its prototypes. In our testing, the reference designs for both the 7900 XTX and 7900 XT seemed pretty good – the former peaked at 80c and the latter at 76c during an hour of strenuous gaming while the fans stayed under 2,000 RPM and the clocks and volume held at a reasonable level.

Maybe MSI was apprehensive about investing in a pair of products that it knew AMD had overhyped. Yet despite the negative reactions that the launch drew from the press and the community, the GPUs have generated enough buzz to get themselves off store shelves. It looks like MSI has potentially lost a significant slice of the holiday sales by dallying.

MSI could rectify the situation and announce their custom cards in just a few weeks at CES 2023. But it might take them longer to get the GPUs on the market and into stores. At least if you want one, you have more time to save up the $1,000 for the 7900 XTX or the $900 for the 7900 XT.