MSI ends AMD GPU partnership due to poor sales

Long time in the making. Hence why the overpriced gaming X trio classic was a dud. Nobody wanted it unless it was given away. AMD is putting more emphasis on their premier partners such as Asrock, Powercolor, XFX and Sapphire. Gigabyte and Asus will follow the same path as MSI. Notice no strix model of AMD anymore? No more AERO or Aorus AMD GPU as well. It will happen in due time.
 
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Flogger23m said:
I'm sure ASUS and whatnot will pick up the slack
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No they won't. The best SKU you can get from Asus on RTX 7000 series is Tuf Gaming, which is decent but overshadowed by the AMD exclusive AIBs like Sapphire, Powercolor, and XFX. Meanwhile Asus has Nvidia SKUs like the ROG Strix, Noctua editions, ProArt, and white cards, all entirely missing in AMD. And if by "whatnot" you mean other AIBs that also produce Nvidia cards, I highly doubt it. And this leads into this post, which I fully expect will happen.

Rvenger said:
Long time in the making. Hence why the overpriced gaming X trio classic was a dud. Nobody wanted it unless it was given away. AMD is putting more emphasis on their premier partners such as Asrock, Powercolor, XFX and Sapphire. Gigabyte and Asus will follow the same path as MSI. Notice no strix model of AMD anymore? No more AERO or Aorus AMD GPU as well. It will happen in due time.
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Maybe Yeston will pick up some traction? They are sort of meme cards but seem interesting lol
 
I don't blame MSI. Nobody is buying AMD cards over Nvidia. The prices are not competitive enough to warrant someone buying their GPU's. The RTX 3060 12GB is a really good card that you can easily find cheap. The only cards AMD has that are 12GB are the 6700XT's and those aren't cheap. I can pick up an RTX 3060 12GB new for $280, while the 6700XT is $320 new. Plus DLSS with better Ray-Tracing performance? As much as the 7700 XT looks like a better deal than the RTX 4070, but people aren't in that price range. There's a reason why the RTX 3060 is picking up as #1 on Steams hardware survey. AMD needs sales, which means they need to lower prices.
 
Dopamin3 said:
AsRock is newer to the scene. When I think big 3 AMD I think Sapphire, Powercolor, XFX. Gigabyte isn't making the premium AMD cards anymore as Rvenger pointed out.
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Asrock has made AMD cards for a while. You make it sound like they just shoved some out the back door last weekend. Gigabyte has made all models of the RDNA series including their most recent card. If they stopped making the top models it is because they have enough stock. They haven't stopped AMD sales and will release all new models. As will Asus, Asrock, XFX and Sapphire. (y)
 
Dopamin3 said:
AsRock is newer to the scene. When I think big 3 AMD I think Sapphire, Powercolor, XFX. Gigabyte isn't making the premium AMD cards anymore as Rvenger pointed out.
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When I meant "big 3" I meant the biggest AIB/AIC partners worldwide. If I recall those three are ASUS, Gigabyte and MSI. For ATI/AMD Sapphire has long been popular. I always thought of it as ATI/AMD's EVGA. Sapphire cooling options seem to be quite nice for the money but I assume their margins are higher for AMD cards than Nvidia currently, which has smaller margins if I recall. Nvidia had to more or less force them to put out a few $600 MSRP models, most of which were functional but lacking in the cooling department like the MSI Ventus.

If Gigabyte is not doing premium AMD cards anymore that can be a troublesome sign. It is also worrisome because AMD's current GPU lineup seems to be better than anything in recent years, IMO. 7900GRE, 7800XT and even the 7900XTX are quite good options.
 
Wonder if they will try Intel again on the next launch...

MSI-Intel-Arc-A380-LP-Graphics-Card-_1.jpg
 
funkydmunky said:
Asrock has made AMD cards for a while. You make it sound like they just shoved some out the back door last weekend.
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Asrock's first AMD release was the RX 580 in 2017. I guess "a while" can be subjective, but when you compare them against ANY other AMD AIB (save Yeston and maybe some obscure brands) they have had cards released long before that. So by me saying "newer to the scene" I am in no way implying they "shoved some out the back door last weekend"...

funkydmunky said:
Gigabyte has made all models of the RDNA series including their most recent card. If they stopped making the top models it is because they have enough stock.
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What does that even mean? It's a worrying sign when they don't make top end models for a generation. Prior to 2018, this was just how it was thanks to Nvidia and their garbage GeForce Partner Program. But if it's happening now, it's not exactly a great sign.

Flogger23m said:
If Gigabyte is not doing premium AMD cards anymore that can be a troublesome sign. It is also worrisome because AMD's current GPU lineup seems to be better than anything in recent years, IMO. 7900GRE, 7800XT and even the 7900XTX are quite good options.
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I agree. Outside of the 4090 for people willing to spend that much, AMD has a compelling product at every price segment. FSR 3.1 is looking pretty good and ray tracing performance / DLSS are moot points for people who just care about rasterization. Even the 6900XT, which seemed to be running on good sales (but inventory is probably starting to dry up) could (have) be(en) a good option in 2024.
 
funkydmunky said:
Asrock has made AMD cards for a while. You make it sound like they just shoved some out the back door last weekend. Gigabyte has made all models of the RDNA series including their most recent card. If they stopped making the top models it is because they have enough stock. They haven't stopped AMD sales and will release all new models. As will Asus, Asrock, XFX and Sapphire. (y)
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What will be interesting is AMD and ASrocks relationship going forward. The main partner for Intel will likely be ASrock going forward.
 
Rvenger said:
What will be interesting is AMD and ASrocks relationship going forward. The main partner for Intel will likely be ASrock going forward.
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MSI has made some direct partnerships with Intel in regards to MSI's handheld Steam Deck competitor. They are the only ones willing to do so at the moment, but it shows that there is something going on between them and there maybe something similar with Asrock as well? Intel has deep pockets and I do think next round they would like a tighter partnership then the no-name brands they initially launched with for ARC. Only makes sense.
We have to realize that with the departure of eVGA from the market, that there is no company in the GPU space that is happy and raking in the $$.
Certain companies are going to have their strong allegiances because there is some kind of bump for them.
 
Dopamin3 said:
What does that even mean? It's a worrying sign when they don't make top end models for a generation.
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I don't know what it even means other then I don't know what you mean?
Gigabyte has made every AMD GPU. When did they skip a generation? Are you imagining future gens?
 
DukenukemX said:
I don't blame MSI. Nobody is buying AMD cards over Nvidia. The prices are not competitive enough to warrant someone buying their GPU's. The RTX 3060 12GB is a really good card that you can easily find cheap. The only cards AMD has that are 12GB are the 6700XT's and those aren't cheap. I can pick up an RTX 3060 12GB new for $280, while the 6700XT is $320 new. Plus DLSS with better Ray-Tracing performance? As much as the 7700 XT looks like a better deal than the RTX 4070, but people aren't in that price range. There's a reason why the RTX 3060 is picking up as #1 on Steams hardware survey. AMD needs sales, which means they need to lower prices.
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6700 XT is a massively better card than the 3060, is absolutely worth forty more dollars, and has been one of the best value cards for a couple of years.

1714199979698.png


The fact there isn't a strictly better replacement for it in its price segment, is insulting to consumers and also a giant flashing sign of what's happening: GPU makers are trying to get everyone to spend more money, for cards which aren't actually upgrades. So to upgrade, you've REALLY gotta spend.

7700XT were ~$350 for about two weeks, without any financing tricks or cashback, early in the year. And I was hoping that would become permanent....



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RE: MSI

I guess its a problem they are backing out. But, I would like to see a different card design language from them. And from every brand, a general slimming down of their designs, as much as possible. Its great to have a solid backplate. But, don't make it any wider than it has to be. Gigabyte figured that out for the Super variants of their Nvidia cards. The 4070 super and ti super are both like 5mm less width on the back of the card. and that's a lot.
 
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Rvenger said:
What will be interesting is AMD and ASrocks relationship going forward. The main partner for Intel will likely be ASrock going forward.
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ASRock seems to have some affordable options for AMD. I know they aren't quite as popular and I never looked into one seriously, but seemingly they offer decent options that are discounted a bit more than XFX and the like. It would certainly be interested if they did Arc as well. I would even be interested in seeing them do Nvidia GPUs.
 
chameleoneel said:
there isn't a strictly better replacement for it in its price segment, is insulting to consumers
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Historically except for RDNA 2, AMD didn't fill out the stack in a single gen, but rather used a mixture of multiple gens to fill the gap.

Looks like going forward we may not see a RDNA 2 like situation again (& there will be gaps within a single gen of AMD models)
 
Marees said:
Nothing in that news report to justify the headline. MSI didn't say that the reason was underperforming AMD GPUs ?

(If MSI can sell underperforming MSI Claw, then they can definitely sell AMD GPUs, imo)
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Underperforming sales of AMD GPUs, not underperforming AMD GPUs. MSI doesn’t care how the GPU performs, they care how it sells.

Which brings me to your second point, because the Claw is an absolute piece of crap that isn’t selling well, and the only reason why I can think MSI went with Intel is that Intel kicked in a bunch of marketing dollars to entice them to select it. The other possible scenario is they wanted to enter the handheld market and AMD told them to pound sand because they didn’t want to sell Radeons, but I think that’s less likely since it would mean AMD would effectively be inviting a strong competitor to partner with a major brand and enter a rapidly growing segment of the market. In any case, I have no idea why anyone would want to buy it. The case for buying AMD GPUs is easy to make, you just have to price them right. MSI is charging more for the Claw than anyone else is asking for their handheld and the performance is measurably inferior in every conceivable aspect.
 
It’s interesting that, just a short time ago, you have EVGA, arguably Nvidia’s best partner in terms of the product they made and no doubt selling well, walk away from a relationship with Nvidia that essentially defined their identity as a company, citing that Nvidia was increasingly difficult to work with, and now you have MSI basically going all-in with Nvidia (and possibly Intel, but if Radeon sales are low, I can’t imagine they’ll do a whole lot better with Intel).

I get the reasons, it’s just interesting. Their Radeon sales must have been abysmal to lead to that.

Anyway, now that we’ve had that conversation, we gamers can return to our regular discussions lamenting about how Nvidia keeps hosing us on price due to a lack of competition.
 
funkydmunky said:
You are aware of what year it is ya?
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Yeah you're totally right. Nearly all of the other AIBs were making cards for ATI long before the AMD acquisition in 2006, and XFX went AMD only in 2008/2009. Asrock in 2017 wasn't newer to the scene in any way, sorry for misspeaking and thanks for calling me out.
funkydmunky said:
I don't know what it even means other then I don't know what you mean?
Gigabyte has made every AMD GPU. When did they skip a generation? Are you imagining future gens?
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I literally quoted you, but to clarify:
"If they stopped making the top models it is because they have enough stock." <---isn't a justification for not making premium cards and could be considered a troublesome sign.
 
Dopamin3 said:
ray tracing performance / DLSS are moot points for people who just care about rasterization
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So you're saying higher visual settings (raytracing) and sacrificing virtually nothing visually (dlss, much better than FSR visual quality) for massively higher framerates aren't attractive to gamers? :ROFLMAO:

Oh and don't forget dlss frame generation + Nvidia Reflex, which together offer nearly double the framerate visually for imperceptibly little input lag. Unlike fsr frame gen, it's in a ton of newer games and works great (speaking from personal experience, not YouTuber videos).

Little wonder between gaming features like those and Cuda, AI, shadow play etc. that msi is seeing low amd sales.
 
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GoldenTiger said:
So you're saying higher visual settings (raytracing) and sacrificing virtually nothing visually (dlss) for massively higher framerates aren't attractive to gamers? :ROFLMAO:
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Yes. I think some people (myself included) don't really care about running ray tracing in titles. And DLSS is the best upscaling right now, but FSR and XeSS are continuing to mature and get better overtime and don't lock you into having Nvidia. Outside of the 4090 essentially being in a league of it's own, AMD has attractive products in basically all price points. Often times, the better value when you just look at rasterization.

Part of the reason why Nvidia sells more is DLSS and ray tracing, which can't be discounted. But I also feel like there is just an intrinisic bias from some people against AMD cards.
 
Keep in mind we don't actually know why they're leaving. The real reason could be anything. But with this AMD is losing an AIB option and Nvidia is losing even more competition (well, or gaining a lack of competition, as far as they're concerned). No one is probably winning here.
 
StoleMyOwnCar said:
Keep in mind we don't actually know why they're leaving. The real reason could be anything. But with this AMD is losing an AIB option and Nvidia is losing even more competition (well, or gaining a lack of competition, as far as they're concerned). No one is probably winning here.
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I’m sure the other AIBs will just increase the amount of AMD GPUs they produce by a small amount and cover the spread, if it was indeed because MSI’s AMD GPU’s weren’t selling well then it’s not a large amount extra for them.
The only reason I often look at MSI’s AMD offerings is because they are usually the cheapest option and I just need something that works.
 
Flogger23m said:
ASRock seems to have some affordable options for AMD. I know they aren't quite as popular and I never looked into one seriously, but seemingly they offer decent options that are discounted a bit more than XFX and the like. It would certainly be interested if they did Arc as well. I would even be interested in seeing them do Nvidia GPUs.
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IMO, Asrock is killing it with their recent designs for RDNA 3. Their cheapest two fan models have good user reviews on Newegg. And their higher stuff looks great, cools great, good noise profile, and somewhat reasonable on size. Also, their white cards don't usually feel like you are paying more for a white card, Vs. the pricing of other cards using the same GPU.

Marees said:
Historically except for RDNA 2, AMD didn't fill out the stack in a single gen, but rather used a mixture of multiple gens to fill the gap.

Looks like going forward we may not see a RDNA 2 like situation again (& there will be gaps within a single gen of AMD models)
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That is true.

But, Nvidia also has not offered a card in the $300 - $350 price point, which also strictly beats a 6700 XT. The 4060 ti is only a little better in performance with only 8GB of RAM. And has consistently sold for $400 or more, for its life so far.

And the 16GB 4060 ti costs even more. So much more, its actually in 7800 XT and 4070 price territory. Those cards are so much faster for similar money, its not even worth comparing the numbers.
 
Dopamin3 said:
Part of the reason why Nvidia sells more is DLSS and ray tracing, which can't be discounted. But I also feel like there is just an intrinisic bias from some people against AMD cards.
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Hmmmmmmm, I wonder why that could be....
 
chameleoneel said:
But, Nvidia also has not offered a card in the $300 - $350 price point, which also strictly beats a 6700 XT. The 4060 ti is only a little better in performance with only 8GB of RAM. And has consistently sold for $400 or more, for its life so far.
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I think the "Super" line is closer to where Nvidia's prices actually drop down to earth and start actually competing. They need to go back and redo the pricing on the older stuff, but my guess is that they just have little incentive to, or are just tied up with other things. Or maybe they just want to see if they can keep the price floor high to make their next gen margins higher. There's still some argument to be made for Nvidia's extra driver features. And AI support. I've seen some people on AI forums that are very much using budget Nvidia GPUs (4060 and below) to do hobby stuff. As long as it works, it's good enough for them, and Nvidia has XFormers, which greatly improves generation speed while lowering memory usage. I don't think AMD has an answer for that. Nvidia is just more premium at the moment. There's no way around it. It's a more complete product. The performance and price difference has to be really high for people to consider AMD at the moment. And I don't know how they'll fix that or if they can.

Lakados said:
I’m sure the other AIBs will just increase the amount of AMD GPUs they produce by a small amount and cover the spread, if it was indeed because MSI’s AMD GPU’s weren’t selling well then it’s not a large amount extra for them.
The only reason I often look at MSI’s AMD offerings is because they are usually the cheapest option and I just need something that works.
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I think they've probably meant to get out of the AMD game for a little while now.
https://pcpartpicker.com/products/v...3,495,496,498,524,554,571,558,559,560,547,548
If you look through their currently available product stack, there's not too much available for the latest gen, and it's clear they're way more Nvidia-focused, where they have a plethora of designs for various cards:
https://pcpartpicker.com/products/v...93,552,553,550,565,549,566,542,567,539&page=1

So you're probably right, they just kept pumping out AMD GPU's with budget designs to nominally stay in the AMD game, but the designs are really basic for their AMD line. This is them saying that they're putting all their eggs in one basket, at least for now. The "it just didn't sell well" is a parting shot that might give them a few quick sales from people going, "well if they weren't selling well, must be a reason, guess I'll go Nvidia".
 
StoleMyOwnCar said:
If you look through their currently available product stack, there's not too much available for the latest gen,
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Asus has as many 4060 skus than all of 7600-7600xt-7700xt-7800xt-7900GRE together I think, not sure MSI RDNA 2 stack was particularly low SKUs for that type of partner AMD offering, they had 3 different 6600 afterall.

StoleMyOwnCar said:
. The "it just didn't sell well" is a parting shot
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Did they say anything like that, seem to have been 100% quiet and only said anything when asked, with a very PR response:
MSI told HardwareLuxx: "When it comes to graphics cards, our focus at the moment is actually more on RTX cards. Nevertheless, the collaboration with AMD is essential and extremely relevant for us. We see a very positive development, particularly in the area of motherboards"
 
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Marees said:
(If MSI can sell underperforming MSI Claw, then they can definitely sell AMD GPUs, imo)
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But are they actually selling the Claw, or is it sitting on store shelves collecting dust? In GN’s review, Steve says he was the only one at the store in Taiwan that asked for one, and the clerk questioned why he wanted to buy it. The kind of customer for the Claw will tend to be computer savvy, and it offers worse performance for more money.

If Intel paid them to make the Claw as an effort to get them into the handheld market, then MSI will make the Claw. AMD has no need to pay them to sell Radeons because they already have other board partners.
 
I'm not a huge fan given that MSI cards have been recently overly expensive but without the quality you'd get from something similarly priced; Gigabyte/AORUS had a similar problem but MSI had their SUPRIM X costing more than even Asus ROG Strix etc. Still, I lament the loss of an OEM for AMD of any sort given they need wider support. Its rather annoying how dominant Nvidia has been with..lets say less than justifiable business practices, proprietary everything, and a huge marketing and lockdown budget without as much pushback as there should have been. AMD has much better drivers on Linux and are open source/free software at that. I'm not eager to see the same situation repeat in time with Gigabyte/AORUS or especially Asus (who still doesn't seem to have air cooled STRIX cards for the top AMD the way they do for NV and last I checked no 7900XTX cards of the type etc), and making it so that AMD cards are only made by "lesser known" OEMs vs the ones that gamers are likely to source NV gpus from as well as their motherboards and other hardare , can't be likely to help. AMD isn't given a fair shot it seems unless its across the board capable of beating NV on features, raw performance, and price etc... so its already coming from a limited position especially with regards to drivers and software support, the amount of NV marketed as exclusive features and more.
 
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