GPU ‘loot boxes’ found on Amazon Japan, mostly selling older GPUs

GPU ‘loot boxes’ found on Amazon Japan, mostly selling older GPUs

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WTF?! In possibly another sign of how bad the PC graphics card market is right now, a sort of loot box system for them has emerged on Amazon Japan. While it does offer a chance to get your hands on an RTX 30 series or Radeon 6000 card, it’s much more likely you’ll end up with a GTX 900 series or something even older.

The seller IGRNG has a product page on Amazon Japan offering a GPU “surprise blind box” for just $100. The box includes a randomly selected Nvidia and AMD graphics card of varying models from the last several years. The description calls it “an adventure about courage and good luck.” As of right now, it’s out of stock with no information on when more supply might come.

From Nvidia’s Ampere series, the page mentions the RTX 3090, RTX 3080 Ti, RTX 3070 Ti, and RTX 3060 Ti. Referring to AMD’s RDNA2 series, the seller lists the RX 6900 XT, RX 6800, RX 6700 XT, and RX 6600 XT. The listing also mentions that a surprise box could contain used cards, but any Ampere and RDNA2 cards are brand new.

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What’s concerning are the actual odds. Buyers have just a two percent chance to win an Ampere or RDNA2 card. There is a four percent chance to win an RTX 20 or RX 5000 card, an eight percent chance to win a GTX 10 series or RX 500, and a 16 percent chance to win a GTX 900 series or RX 300. The other 70 percent are “other” cards, including older GPUs. Currently, the page only has two reviews, one from someone who hadn’t even bought the box.

With prices as they are, $100 might still be a good bet, even for one of the older cards. Cards like the seven-year-old GTX 980 still go for several hundred dollars. If nothing else, a customer could profit from winning and then flipping an older card.

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