AMD Slashes Pricing AGAIN

[SPBHM]

Games are using more and more VRAM. Shogun 2, Skyrim, Arkham City, etc. 1 GB cards are not going to last long.

it really depends on the settings, I would agree that for an extra 20% the 2GB version might be a better choice for some, but the 1GB is clearly still a good card for gaming most current games at high details in 1080p.

way faster than the 7770, and a good amount faster than the 6870/GTX 560, and if you overclock it... just look at the BF3 performance I posted... great card for 159.

 

[RussianSensation]

It is a good time to be a PC Gamer, but a bad time to be a company like AMD bleeding red-ink all over the place. These price cuts hurt AMD.

AMD does not appear to have suffered in this case as the company didn't cut the prices, its partners did. That means AMD still sells the 7770/7850 chips to their partners at similar profit margins.

Xbitlabs reports that "AMD said that it did not slash official prices of graphics boards, but rather its partners among manufacturers lowered their pricing."

The node shrink actually raised profit margins per wafer and we all know these cards were overpriced to begin with so the price drops aren't significant for anyone but the consumer. It's just the trend, gpu makers release at top dollar to get the money wasters and price falls in line with competition.

Pretty much, they are called "early adopters" in technology and they are willing to pay a price premium for the latest and greatest tech. That's the whole point behind the first mover advantage launch strategy. You launch a more technologically advanced product and charge much higher prices than what you would have been able to execute otherwise had you waited to launch later in a marketplace where your technology is not cutting edge anymore. The expected outcome is to go in first and dictate higher price by having a more advanced product vs. outdated technology of your competition, and then lower prices over time as competition catches up or surpasses your technology. Essentially instead of launching 7950 at $299 and 7970 at $369 and HD7850/7870 at $179/229, you launch at a much higher prices and over time lower them to what you normally used as your price/performance launch prices. If this works, you get to earn much higher margins throughout the entire generation and then towards the 2nd half of a generation you resort to using your price/performance strategy. The biggest obstacle is if you had competed on price for a long-time, consumers get sticker shock and may abandon your brand because they feel you raised prices on them or maybe they thought your brand was supposed to be a price/performance brand and not a premium brand. ATI and NV have generally used this strategy (launch at high prices and drop prices over time, and launch a new generation at the previous high prices, rinse and repeat).

Since people have never seen AMD graphics division use this strategy, and generally people have short memory, they think AMD is desperate to lower prices while this is exactly what you are supposed to do. Because you launch first, you allow your competitor to analyze your product in detail which generally means they have time to release a superior version at a later date. The best examples of this strategy are iPhone and iPad, where entire segments were reinvented allowing for a substantial head start and high price premium of the market leader. In GPUs, the window of opportunity is very small to execute this approach, but when it works, it works well especially if the competitor fails to launch a superior product at a later time (9700Pro, 8800GTX).

 

[notty22]

Xbit added that as an update. It makes you wonder if even on a very small die chip , there are a lot of chips that don't cut it as 7870's in turn having to keep making the price more attractive on the 7850 to move them in the market. Even with all the fan praise they are getting on some forums.

 

[RussianSensation]

You just tied 2 separate points into 1. Or it could be the case that HD7870 competes with GTX660 on price in the marketplace and HD7850 1GB and 2GB cards were not only priced too closely to each other but to HD7870? Considering most HD7870s are going for $230-240 on Newegg, I think it was calculated to move 7850 well below the $200 mark.

There could be all kinds of factors, even GTX650Ti launch. Binning 7850 and 7870 is not different than NV having excess failed GK104 chips that are used in the $300 660Ti and $400 670. Isn't that how most lower SKUs have been formed in the past?

Some consumers cannot afford a $220 7870 so it makes sense to service the lower price segments. AMD still has a hole between $119 and $159 which is where GTX650Ti will fall nicely. Maybe this will force NV to launch 650Ti at $139 instead of $149? Competition is good.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Nvidia: "What <$200 segment? We don't need that!"

With the 7850 2GB at $189 the value for dollar is finally as good as the good old $150 5850.

 

[atticus14]

Well its good to hear but so far OCT has seen a small increase in prices @ newegg. Sometimes I think the start of months are the worst times to buy. Asus had their 7850 for 177(AR) and Sapphire I think had one for 179(AR) at the end of Sept. but now we are looking +10-30 bucks. As others have said a 7870 for 200 is still a no brainer at this point.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

I realize that they're rare pricing abberations, but the $280 GTX680 and $310 7970 have completely obliterated my sense of value for this generation of cards

 

[daveybrat]

Wow, if this is true, i might have to finally upgrade my GTX 460 to a new 7850 card when the new pricing takes place.

 

[Siberian]

It is a good time to be a PC Gamer, but a bad time to be a company like AMD bleeding red-ink all over the place. These price cuts hurt AMD.

Their stock has crashed in the last 6 months. These constant price drops are in response to poor sales. Had the 7xxx series been competitve, I don't think they would be in it so deep.

 

[AnandThenMan]

Had the 7xxx series been competitve...

 

[The Alias]

Their stock has crashed in the last 6 months. These constant price drops are in response to poor sales. Had the 7xxx series been competitve, I don't think they would be in it so deep.

the 7xxx series outperforms every single one of it's nvidia counterparts dude !

 

[blastingcap]

Read his post history if you want to be de-confused.

 

[AnandThenMan]

Read his post history if you want to be de-confused.

I have, but did not expect even him to state something so absurd. This is the closest generation in terms of performance that I can remember.

 

[gammaray]

Money. Believe it or not but there are many of us tightwads out there that want more value for our money. I'd say the non upgraders outnumber the upgraders by far and AMD is trying to reel us in. They know we're out there and they want those dollars for themselves IMO.

Could be / good point.

Also, AMD as a whole might go bankrupt...unfortunately.

Past ten years they lost so much money its a wonder they're still in business.

they got 1 billion from intel 1 or 2 years ago, and imho thats what kept them going.

 

[blastingcap]

Could be / good point.

Also, AMD as a whole might go bankrupt...unfortunately.

Past ten years they lost so much money its a wonder they're still in business.

they got 1 billion from intel 1 or 2 years ago, and imho thats what kept them going.

Do you have any idea WHY they got money from Intel? Hint: Intel did naughty, illegal things. Intel is no angel, okay? I'm pretty sure AMD would have preferred that Intel NOT do those things and NOT pay AMD $1 billion, but nobody knows exactly what would have happened had Intel played fair.. AMD could still be screwed as they are today, or maybe not. We'll never know.

 

[Siberian]

I have, but did not expect even him to state something so absurd. This is the closest generation in terms of performance that I can remember.

They are competing with NVIDIA's mid range chip. That is highly disapointing. These price cuts are a sign of poor sales (the steam survey mirrors this). They still have no answer for the 690.

Nothing I said is absurd, it's just the reality of the situatuion.

 

[Red Hawk]

They are competing with NVIDIA's mid range chip. That is highly disapointing. These price cuts are a sign of poor sales (the steam survey mirrors this). They still have no answer for the 690.

Nothing I said is absurd, it's just the reality of the situatuion.

Correction: The are competing with Nvidia's highest single chip GPU. That's the reality. They may not have any official competition for the 690, true, but that hardly paints the whole picture.

 

[RussianSensation]

I realize that they're rare pricing abberations, but the $280 GTX680 and $310 7970 have completely obliterated my sense of value for this generation of cards

There was a sale for a 680 for $280?

 

[RussianSensation]

Their stock has crashed in the last 6 months. These constant price drops are in response to poor sales. Had the 7xxx series been competitve, I don't think they would be in it so deep.

Desktop discrete GPUs are just 8% of the cash flow of AMD. AMD's stock performance can't possibly have anything to do with its debt and related interest payments, future debt obligations to global foundries, lack of competitive CPU (APU) offering for tablets and smartphones against Qualcomm, ARM, Texas Instruments, etc. or how poorly the rest of the company is doing in relation to desktop / laptop CPUs and servers? No wait, it was HD7000 series that did it, especially since AMD graphics did better last quarter than NV's. :whiste:

http://www.trefis.com/company?hm=AMD.trefis&from=search#/AMD/n-0856?from=sankey

Implying that AMD's stock has fallen by 60-70% because of a product line that contributes just 8% to the entire firm is illogical.

Some people in this sub-forum have complained that all we do is discuss GPUs and in other sub-forums such as our CPUs and Overclocking thread, people discuss implications for the firms, stategic and other operational aspects. It's more or less impossible to have these type of discussions in this sub-forum when even publicly available data is either ignored or is being manipulated to suit an agenda.

They are competing with NVIDIA's mid range chip. That is highly disapointing. These price cuts are a sign of poor sales (the steam survey mirrors this). They still have no answer for the 690.

If GK104 is in fact a mid-range Kepler, NV could not launch GK110 either financially or from a wafer/yield perspective. Therefore, it has made GK104 this generation's flagship product.

By your admission that AMD is failing since they are competing with a mid-range Kepler, every person who bought a $400-500 GTX670-680 got suckered by NV to spend 4-5 bills on a mid-range GPU. So you are saying people who bought GTX670/680 got ripped off then because they paid $400-500 for a $250 GPU?

AMD used the first mover advantage strategy, something NV utilized in the past frequently, including GTX260/280 launch. Interesting how this is news to you know that a company releases faster tech first and prices it high and then if necessary drops prices over time in lieu of a more competitive landscape.

It's also interesting to hear that AMD is failing considering they had the lead in performance and price/performance from January 9th to mid-March and then from mid-June to now in every price category under $500. You get faster performance for less $ with AMD, more overclocking, more VRAM without a price premium, voltage control for free. NV had a brilliant quarter from March to Mid-June and then AMD repriced their entire line and released faster drivers putting NV in the backseat with 660Ti losing to 7950 OC, 670 losing to HD7970, GTX680 losing to 7970 GE, and NV not offering anything worth buying < $300 for almost 8 months of this generation.

AMD also had 3 free games bundle and continues to offer Sleeping Dogs. Looks like BL2 promo has run out already. Yup, that's definitely failing for AMD.

Remember when you first joined the forums and right away you said AMD makes budget products and they have worse quality? What happened to that statement now that NV admitted any voltage above stock voltage on Kepler causes electromigration that could send the chip to the grave within 2 years? So much for your argument that AMD cards are poorly built.

Notice the trend here - you don't seem to come off as a very objective poster. You should just admit you hate AMD and AMD graphics and everyone would move on.

the 7xxx series outperforms every single one of it's nvidia counterparts dude !

What about PhysX? That's got to be worth $100+ for the 3 games that use it a year.

It's also amusing to hear that lower prices for consumers are a bad outcome and a sign that AMD is failing but when NV keeps prices of GTX670/680 high for almost 8 months, that's supposedly respectful and good for us consumers? Amazing.

HD7750 for $90 > GT640
HD7770 Ghz for $105 > GTX650
HD7850 1/2GB = no competitor
1.1ghz 7870 for $195 > GTX660
Sub-$300 HD7950 MSI TF3 is better than any 660Ti and overclocks to match GTX670 OC.
1Ghz 7970 = GTX680 for $388.
1.1Ghz 7970 $450 > EVGA Classified 680 for $630.

In Canada an after-market 7970 can be found for $350 CDN. You can almost buy 2 of these cards for the price of a single Classified 680.

It's pretty funny the same people criticized AMD for charging high prices when NV was selling 580 for $430-440 and then when AMD finally lowered prices, they label the firm desperate.

 

[SirPauly]

How did AMD do better in graphics last quarter -- the link you offered shows 40.3 share for AMD?

 

[thilanliyan]

They are competing with NVIDIA's mid range chip.

Great!! Where can I buy their high end single ship card? If the 680 is only mid-range then there must be something higher?

GTX690 is just 2 mid-range chips right?

 

[Siberian]

How did AMD do better in graphics last quarter -- the link you offered shows 40.3 share for AMD?

I think he is intentionally being misleading.

 

[cplusplus]

How did AMD do better in graphics last quarter -- the link you offered shows 40.3 share for AMD?

They gained marketshare, nVidia lost it. I'm pretty sure that's what he means. But you probably already knew that.

 

[SirPauly]

Wonderful way to word it with a blanket term that AMD did better last quarter than nVidia, when nVidia holds a 59.3 edge over 40.3 for AMD.

And the irony was this offered by Russian strongly:

It's more or less impossible to have these type of discussions in this sub-forum when even publicly available data is either ignored or is being manipulated to suit an agenda.

 

[wand3r3r]

Obviously he means quarter over quarter or some other metric. I don't have the data nor will I go search due to time constraints but 40.3% of the quarters shipments is probably up from the previous quarter so AMD most likely did better as in for that quarter. AMD doesn't ship more units then NV but the market share fluctuates.

If AMD is increasing in market share it means NV is decreasing. Who is doing better? That is the point most likely. I'm sure he will be in here to spell it out at some point.

Back on topic, price cuts are great. This generation has been quite overpriced.