The GeForce RTX 3080’s higher-memory variant may be making an official comeback.
Per a tweet from MEGAsizeGPU, NVIDIA has supposedly resumed the production of the GeForce RTX 3080 (12 GB), a graphics card that the company began distancing itself from two months ago. Apparently, there’s “too much stock” of the GA102, the GPU used in the GeForce RTX 3080 and GeForce RTX 3090 Series, as well as various other models aimed at the professional market.
Because there is too much stock of GA102, Nvidia has resumed the supply of 3080 12G.
— MEGAsizeGPU (@Zed__Wang) August 14, 2022
The 3080 12G just stopped production for less than two months, and recently resumed production quickly.
This is probably just NVIDIA’s way of making better use of pre-existing inventory, as explained by VideoCardz.
NVIDIA can make RTX 3080 12GB cards regardless if the GA102 inventory has enough suitable chips or not. We have seen this many times, when the company repurposed its higher-end GPUs for other models, simply to continue the production of more affordable SKUs. This may lead to lower profits, but NVIDIA will get rid of the GA102 stock one way or the other.
NVIDIA can make RTX 3080 12GB cards regardless if the GA102 inventory has enough suitable chips or not. We have seen this many times, when the company repurposed its higher-end GPUs for other models, simply to continue the production of more affordable SKUs. This may lead to lower profits, but NVIDIA will get rid of the GA102 stock one way or the other.
NVIDIA launched the 12 GB version of the GeForce RTX 3080 in January 2022. Although it released with relatively little fanfare from the company, the graphics card features 2 GB of additional GDDR6X memory over its standard sibling, including a higher, 384-bit memory interface width.
The GeForce RTX 3080 (12 GB) never received an official MSRP, but the 10 GB version launched at $699.
Source: MEGAsizeGPU