It seems the ongoing drama that has been the launch of Nvidia's 30 Series graphic cards is continuing. Following two launches that saw both the GeForce RTX 3080 and the GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Editions sell out instantly on Nvidia's website, Nvidia has decided on a dramatic solution to no longer sell 3080 and 3090 Founders Editions through its website.
In a post made on Nvidia's forums, staff member Suroosh@Nvidia shared the news with prospective graphics card buyers. The GeForce RTX 3080 and 3090 Founders Edition graphics cards will no longer be restocked through Nvidia's official online store, and this decision is being made in direct response to feedback — though what feedback exactly isn't specified. It's likely referring to the belief that Nvidia's store doesn't provide adequate protection from bots and scalpers, making purchases by a normal shopper difficult.
Instead of offering the 3080 and 3090 Founders Editions through Nvidia's own store, the company says it will be selling them through its partners. In the United States, Nvidia's only partner for the 3080 and 3090 Founders Edition cards is Best Buy. Best Buy has been a more reliable storefront for card sales when compared to Nvidia, though not by a huge margin. A recent restock saw Best Buy's 3080 FE cards staying available for only several minutes.
As for future restocks, Nvidia has some positive news to share regarding both the 3080 and 3090 FEs. More cards will be available in "the coming weeks," though Nvidia does reiterate that these Founders Edition cards are limited by nature. Third-party 3080s and 3090s will also continue to roll out in what Nvidia describes as an "increasing supply." No specifics were shared, but the news is still encouraging to a degree.
Nvidia says that in the meantime, it plans on working to improve the quality of its storefront. This is something that Nvidia said it would do previously, but it seems that the work required to improve the website for the 30 Series graphics card launches was more than expected. Perhaps the storefront will be ready for the next generation of Nvidia cards.
One notable topic was ignored in Nvidia's statement, that being the forthcoming launch of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 cards. The RTX 3070 will also have a Founders Edition, which will be launching on October 29 along with third-party manufacturer cards. Nvidia appears to be proceeding with releasing 3070s on its own website, despite offloading 3080s and 3090s onto Best Buy. It's unclear why, though potential 3070 buyers should be wary of relying on Nvidia's storefront compared to other websites.
The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 and 3090 graphics cards are available now. Nvidia's GeForce RTX 3070 releases October 29.
Source: Nvidia