Nvidia reportedly no longer supplying VRAM to its GPU board partners in response to memory crunch — rumor claims vendors will only get the die, forced to source memory on their own

GDDR7 graphics memory standard published (GDDR6X shown)

(Image credit: Tom's Hardware)

The entire industry is currently navigating a memory crisis, with companies pivoting to favor AI clients over retail markets, leading to a severe drought that's expected to only worsen. Nvidia, the world's largest GPU manufacturer and a leading beneficiary in the AI boom, seems to now be affected by a problem it helped exacerbate. According to leaker Golden Pig Upgrade, Nvidia has stopped bundling video memory with its GPUs that it sells to AIBs, leaving partners to source the required VRAM on their own.

Golden Pig Upgrade on Weibo mentioning the rumor that Nvidia is no longer bundling VRAM with its GPUs sold to board partners — (Image credit: Future)

EVGA GeForce RTX 4090 FTW3 Prototype Graphics Card — (Image credit: YouTube - JayzTwoCents)

A lot of you may remember how EVGA left the industry, citing growing tensions with Nvidia, alleging mistreatment. Not to speculate too much, but leaving vendors to buy cutting-edge VRAM on their own could put a lot more pressure on low-scale operations, putting them at risk of shutting down, unable to weather the memory drought.

All that being said, this is still just a rumor, so take the news with a huge grain of salt. If it's true, Nvidia is potentially leaving money on the table that would otherwise come home by selling marked-up modules, implying that the economics just don't make sense anymore in the current landscape. All production lines have been hijacked by AI for the foreseeable future.

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Hassam Nasir is a die-hard hardware enthusiast with years of experience as a tech editor and writer, focusing on detailed CPU comparisons and general hardware news. When he’s not working, you’ll find him bending tubes for his ever-evolving custom water-loop gaming rig or benchmarking the latest CPUs and GPUs just for fun.

15 Comments Comment from the forums

Crazyy8

Rise and grind money makers, it's time to dust off the GPU buying bots and scalp-o-matics, Nfeedia is granting us Chip Shortage 2: Electric Boogaloo.
Reply
JamesLahey

Nvidia, profiting hugely from this rush to purchase, showing scorn for its vendors and by extension, former breadwinners in gaming.

Pretty shameful if it is as-reported.
Reply
Roland Of Gilead

Crazyy8 said:
Time to dust off the GPU buying bots and scalp-o-matics, we're heading to Chip Shortage 2: Electric Boogaloo.
:tearsofjoy:
Reply
-Fran-

Haha, this doesn't even surprise me anymore.

Now, to be fair, why were they even bundling the VRAM before? Why couldn't AIBs just get the VRAM via their own means before if they didn't want to pay whatever nVidia told them? I see this as a good thing, if it stays that way. But let's be real, it won't. They'll keep the wife-abusing tactics with their AIBs and the AIBs will say nVidia is not abusive and keep producing their babies.

Regards.
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Jabberwocky79

So... what you're telling me is that just when GPU prices were beginning to stabilize, they are gonna go through the roof again. I'm not surprised, I couldn't see how the memory issue wouldn't affect GPUs. Anyways, SO glad I built when I did. The Corsair Dominators I bought a year ago for $275 are currently selling for $950.00. That is just all levels of stupid.
Reply
ezst036

-Fran- said:
Now, to be fair, why were they even bundling the VRAM before?
Rumor is Nvidia bundled to increase quality.

Quality kind of went out the window though with the 12VHPWR connector and all the meltdowns though so memory bundling is kind of nonsensical on Nvidia's part.
Reply
ManDaddio

ezst036 said:
Rumor is Nvidia bundled to increase quality.

Quality kind of went out the window though with the 12VHPWR connector and all the meltdowns though so memory bundling is kind of nonsensical on Nvidia's part.
There is no real issue with the 12v power connector. It's just over blown because social media.
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ManDaddio

It made a lot of sense bundling the VRAM because NVIDIA could get a much better price buying in volume in line with how many dies they were planning on producing.

It speeds the process up a lot.

Now the AIB has to order hoping they get what they ordered then have to wait to order the VRAM only after they confirm the order is shipping.
Time is money.

NVIDIA was selling smart.

People just don't understand how good business works.

I'm just speculating but that's what I think.
Reply
thestryker

-Fran- said:
Haha, this doesn't even surprise me anymore.

Now, to be fair, why were they even bundling the VRAM before? Why couldn't AIBs just get the VRAM via their own means before if they didn't want to pay whatever nVidia told them? I see this as a good thing, if it stays that way. But let's be real, it won't. They'll keep the wife-abusing tactics with their AIBs and the AIBs will say nVidia is not abusive and keep producing their babies.

Regards.
With GDDR5X/6X these were nvidia exclusive so single source makes some sense. With GDDR7 nvidia bought the majority of the supply so it was actually more expensive for AIBs to source their own. I haven't seen any consistent reporting on the GDDR6 situation, but my understanding is that bundling wasn't as common here. Scale also matters so while I'd bet your MSI/Asus/Gigabyte type companies could go either way it's harder for the smaller ones.
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Mindstab Thrull

So basically, if you're not ASUS, MSI, or some other company that has their fingers in a lot of pies, your GPUs are going to cost more because you'll have to pay more for the same memory because you can't buy in the same quantities. And if anyone could afford the price increase, it's Nvidia, not the board partners. So I expect Zotac, Colorful, and a lot of other smaller outfits to have to charge more and find unique ways of getting their cards to be, in the eyes on the consumers, worth paying the extra.
Picking numbers out of a hat for the purpose of illustration:
Nvidia might have been paying $50 for N amount of memory. They might have to pay 75 now.
An ASUS-level company (in terms of portfolio, buying power, etc) might be paying 100 now.
A Zotac might be paying 150. (They've been around a long time and got into lots of things over the years.)
A Colorful could be looking at 200.

Not only does it mean that your VRAM might be different than mine due to company, die, etc, but one might be stuck on old-stock GDDR6 while another company runs high-speed GDDR7, which means now you can't even compare GPUs easily. It's almost like saying "I have an i7" without saying what generation, let alone how much memory or anything else about your PC.
The only thing this does is enhance confusion in the marketplace.
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