Bitcoin Forum

I am trying to buy a GPU as a gift and wherever I look, it looks like prices doubled from what they were like 1 year ago.

Whats a fair price for a 7970? 280X ? to pay

Where have you been looking?

http://gpushack.com/

eBay

New? Used (as a gift?!?)?

Deals on new kit come along all the time on http://www.newegg.com/Desktop-Graphics-Cards/SubCategory/ID-48 (http://www.newegg.com/Desktop-Graphics-Cards/SubCategory/ID-48), amazon, others. They have a brand new XFX 380 4GB for $170 incl. $20 rebate (a lot better than the XFX 280 3GB refurb for $190 gpushack is offering, essentially the same thing but new for $150 incl. rebate). Newegg sometimes offers current model refurbs with warranty for a smidge less if you care. (No affiliation with them, I just like the service — plenty of other secondary retail you can google.)

And eBay... well, not a good place to judge prices, imho. :D

The 380 is slower than 280x in the Ethereum mining.

The GPUs are more expensive than last year, because they are useful for Ethereum mining.

There is no such GPU for sale on gpuShack, or for that price, for that matter.

So the best bang for the big is a 7950/7970 ? The 280X seems too expensive, 270X is too slow, and 290X runs too high and expensive?

Check out http://mining.gpushack.com

Best Bang/Buck is HD 7950, followed by R9 280X.

Gpus have always costed alot, at least for gaming, i know that my GPU was the most expensive part of my rig. I dont see anything wrong with paying 200$ for a decent one. But always first hand

I stand corrected, the one I was looking at was the $150 lesser model http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150706 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150706) instead of the $219 DD version http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150678 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150678).

Even so, the extra $30 for a new one includes lifetime warranty on parts/labor and 30-day refund/replacement, which you apparently don't/can't offer on your refurbs... :-\

Ebay sold listings for the 280X are ranging $130-$170. http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_sacat=0&_nkw=XFX%20280X&rt=nc&LH_Sold=1&LH_Complete=1 (http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_sacat=0&_nkw=XFX%20280X&rt=nc&LH_Sold=1&LH_Complete=1)

This website catched my eye. Even if they're refurbished, they have a 2 years warranty that could decide me to buy one.

I have used them and they sent me a good 280x.  No problems.

If you have the space, the upgraded fans look like a very good idea - though a 6 watt fan isn't super heavy duty, it's probably a good bit more than the average factory fan and probably flows a lot more air.

 I ended up doing something similar with some of my HIS 7750 cards when the CRAP stock fans on those died - had some 60mm Delta fans left over from CPU coolers I don't use any more, so just wire-tied them to the HS and VOLLA!!!! 15 or so degrees cooler than the stock fans EVER managed - just had to plug them into a 12V "peripheral" MOLEX from the power supply, as there's no way the card itself was going to handle the power draw.

 My Sapphire 7750 on the other hand just keeps going and going and going *WITH* the stock fan......

Just be careful, many XFX cards' voltage cannot be reduced. So the power consumption is quite high.

Happy to report that gpuShack will now be using 15W fans instead of 6W fans for all mining GPUs (link in sig).

If I have 6 graphics card in the rig, the power consumption of the fans will be 90W if you use one each graphics cards. That is quite a lot.

You can control the fans with your own fan voltage control solution. Although, better cooling results in more stable performance.

I was not able to locate this card on newegg

You snooze, you lose — it's now $199 after $20 rebate, sale's over
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150730&cm_re=xfx_r9_380x-_-14-150-730-_-Product (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150730&cm_re=xfx_r9_380x-_-14-150-730-_-Product)

Yes. Thank you

Regardless it is still a decent price for a new card compared to a used

A used 7970 costs about $140 in my country. So $170 for a new 380 is quite decent. But it mines slower than 7970.

Do you think people are buying the used GPU to mine Ethereum? It is the only profitable coin for me.

I may need assistance in setting up a machine. Will respond again once I get prices on used components

I think the GPU are expensive because the altcoin is profitable to mine again for some medium electriicity price miners.

Yes. But when the X11 ASIC miner are widely available, the price of GPU will drop again. That happened two years ago when the Scrypt ASIC were out.

These Secondstrade spammers are at it again. Posting irrelevent information just to get paid for posting.

Brand new Sapphire R7 370 4GB $140 ($30 off), gets about 15MH/s
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202152
unless of course you don't like Sapphire kit

It is better to buy R9 390. You can get more hash per rig and so the overheads of the rig is reduced to achieve the same hash.

When buying a new gpu you might want to factor in the length of the warranty period.
Depending on where you live and what card you buy this may vary.
All my 280X cards carry a 3 year warranty, while the GTX 970 only has a 2 year warranty.
Recently I RMAed an ASUS R9 280X after just over 2 years of non-stop running due to a bad fan.
And I got my full money back.  I would have been out of luck if the warrany period was only two years..
 

That is very good. With the money you paid for the 280x, you can buy a R9 390 now. That is a good increase in hash rate.

You mean R9 380(x)? I don't see any 390's for less than $300 probably because they're all 8GB, and 4GB 380's are $190 and up. (Not looking at used market of course...)

I think R9 390 is better for the long term. It has 8GB memory. The Ethereum will convert to PoS next year, but Expanse might not. So if you continue to mine, you need larger memory.

in 1 year you can still go with 4 gb, so this is a very long term thing, and i'm not sure if it is right to remain with the same gpu for a long term when for the next year new gpu will be available

The R9 390 is an old GPU, but it is still faster than R9 Fury or Fury XT in the Ethereum mining.

That is because the developers did not take advantage of the newer structures of the Fury cards.

I think you are looking in the wrong places.  I know this sounds stupid, but go to the goodwill or to yard sales.  People have these in their computers and will sell the computer used for less than what you would paid for a nice used GPU from a store.  Just an idea.

I shop yard sales,all I find is scraper PCs,which I tear down & sell the parts on Ebay for gold recovery.I have not yet found a decent high end system with a good vid card  :(

HDD platters,magnets & circuit boards are worth a few bucks,as are cd/dvd rom boards.PSU & cases I give to a scrap guy to get rid of,steel prices suck & aren't worth my time LOL

I check all the ram,cpu's,hdd,cd/dvd roms.If they work & are not too outdated,I hang on to them to build basic PCs for websurfing  ;)