- Nvidia’s RTX 3060 has returned to retailers amid the ongoing RAM crisis
- MSI, Gigabyte and Asus models reportedly started at $339.99, but have apparently gone up
- It’s a sign that the current state of the PC hardware market is in complete disarray in terms of shortages and pricing
The PC and console hardware market is arguably in the worst place it’s ever been, with the RAM crisis driving high prices for components that use memory. Therefore, the return of a popular GPU is one that does not come as a huge surprise.
As reported by Tom’s Hardware, the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 graphics card has returned to retailers, most notably on Newegg, with several Asus, MSI, and Gigabyte models available.
While Tom’s Hardware highlights that prices for these returning GPU models were seen at $339.99 (which is $10 above MSRP when they launched), listings range from at least $416. It’s already a big ask at $339 for an old graphics card that doesn’t have the same benefits as the current generation RTX 5060, so the increase won’t do much good.
It’s worth noting that the RTX 3060 has been the most popular GPU on PC, according to Steam’s Hardware & Software Survey results, consistently ranking number one every month for several years. The same trend is evident in May’s results, and likely the same for June.
The 12GB GPU is still very much capable of delivering solid performance in games at 1080p or 1440p, especially when using DLSS upscaling, which explains why it’s still so popular with Steam users.
However, it is not exactly received well among consumers. My colleague and PC enthusiast Matthew Hanson sees the return of the RTX 3060 “like **t Frankenstein”, and frankly that’s a fair observation and one that highlights just how messed up the PC hardware market is.
Users on Reddit haven’t been shy about highlighting why the GPU’s return doesn’t make much sense, with one saying: “Even Nvidia enthusiasts would be hard-pressed to get this for $339.99. At that point, just get an RTX 5060.
“The only real advantage of this the card is VRAM, so we all know who it’s really for – the AI crowd.”
It’s not that the RTX 3060 is a bad graphics card, because it’s far from the case. However, at the current price that the models from MSI and others are available at, it makes little or no sense, as the RTX 5060 is in the same price range, and it has the advantage of Multi-Frame Generation over the RTX 3060.
Regardless, another option on the market doesn’t hurt, especially since it doesn’t look like its unstable state will change anytime soon.
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