Please note that this post is tagged as a rumor.
Rumor claims NVIDIA will now ship only GPUs, leaving partners to buy GDDR on their own
We often remind you that NVIDIA does not sell only GPUs. All AI and data center aside, what gamers need to know is that NVIDIA sells bundles of memory and GPU together. This has been the model for years and it is an easy way for board makers to obtain the most important components for graphics cards. Everything else can be sourced through normal channels, and everything else is what makes custom graphics cards ‘special’.
However, we are now facing a memory shortage, and apparently NVIDIA is changing how it works with board partners. According to hardware leaker “Golden Pig Upgrade Pack”, while the company previously supplied both GPU cores and the matching memory chips to board makers, it now only ships the GPU die, while AICs must secure their own GDDR memory.
Under the earlier model, AICs bought a complete package that paired GPU cores with preselected memory. This simplified purchases and kept specifications tightly controlled. If the rumor is real, partners now have to negotiate directly with DRAM vendors for GDDR6X or GDDR7 chips, manage fast-moving prices on their own, and ensure those parts line up with NVIDIA reference designs. That shifts more supply-chain risk from NVIDIA to its partners.
Golden Pig says this change hits smaller brands hardest. Companies without long-standing links to memory suppliers are described as being ignored when they try to arrange allocations, making it harder for them to stay in the graphics card business at all. I imagine that if EVGA was still around, it would have found a way to source the memory, but each time these changes are reported. I immediately recall how EVGA described the situation for NVIDIA board partners as growing in tension. It definitely doesn’t get any easier.
Source: Golden Pig Upgrade