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NVIDIA addresses RTX 3080 availability, apologizes for underestimating demand

The RTX 3080 GPU developer has promised efforts to combat bot purchasing during the next round of sales.

TJ Denzer

September 21, 2020 10:57 AM

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If you were on the lookout for an RTX 3080 card when orders first went live on September 17, then you already know how hard it was to get one. Every retailer carrying them sold out nearly instantly once the sales started. It was a record high for many retailers and the NVIDIA website, but it left many soured and unable to pick up a card in the fracas as well. NVIDIA has officially addressed concerns, apologizing for the underestimation of buyer demand, as well as promising greater security measures to ensure would-be buyers have a fair shake at getting their hands on the card during the next round of sales.

NVIDIA launched its lengthy address of RTX 3080 availability issues on September 21, 2020. According to the address, both NVIDIA and its partners who took part in the first day sales highly underestimated the volume of customer demand for its new GPU.

“We expected the best ever demand for the RTX 30-series, but the enthusiasm was overwhelming,” NVIDIA wrote. “We were not prepared for this level, nor were our partners. We apologize for this.”

The fact of the matter is that a lot of buyers may have used automated systems to get their hands on multiple cards during the opening sales of the RTX 3080. If eBay is any indication, resellers were out for blood when the RTX 3080 launched. NVIDIA isn’t taking this point lying down and has announced measures to keep automated and malicious bots from overwhelming the system and blocking out buyer demand of the next stock of cards, including the establishment of a separate sales site and CAPTCHA anti-bot software for future sales.

As with many other etailers, the NVIDIA Store was also overrun with malicious bots and resellers. To combat this challenge we have made the following changes: we moved our NVIDIA Store to a dedicated environment, with increased capacity and more bot protection. We updated the code to be more efficient on the server load. We integrated CAPTCHA to the checkout flow to help offset the use of bots. We implemented additional security protections to the store APIs. And more efforts are underway.

With the full scope of demand now realized, NVIDIA and its partners have promised to up production in order to meet buyer interest for the next round. As we await that round, be sure to keep an eye on NVIDIA’s product finder, use auto-notify settings, and follow our RTX buying guide to stay adrift if you’re in the market for any of the new RTX 30-Series GPUs.

TJ Denzer

Senior News Editor

TJ Denzer is a player and writer with a passion for games that has dominated a lifetime. He found his way to the Shacknews roster in late 2019 and has worked his way to Senior News Editor since. Between news coverage, he also aides notably in livestream projects like the indie game-focused Indie-licious, the Shacknews Stimulus Games, and the Shacknews Dump. You can reach him at tj.denzer@shacknews.com and also find him on Twitter @JohnnyChugs.