The new year is off to a rough start for some after orders from Corsair, and now ZOTAC were cancelled and then re-upped at a higher price. Buyers beware, as you never know if your order will be fulfilled at the agreed-upon price in these uncertain times. Reports (via VideoCardz) involving PC parts retailer Corsair began to surface at the start of the new year when one person revealed their $3,499 custom PC order was getting cancelled, only for the same build to reappear later for $800 more. The company did make good on the order after multiple media outlets and social media covered this incident, but this was not to be a one-time case.
Corsair’s sales reps had stated there was an error with its webstore, which led to the aforementioned incident, but then other consumers reported a similar situation regarding discounted 48GB DDR6 memory kits. Orders involving coupons for these kits were canceled, and refunds were issued as coupons had the incorrect expiration code, but it then offered new ones for items that might still be “in stock”, a laughable joke given the current memory supply situation. Just yesterday, it also issued the following statement on the matter.
Per Corsair Press Release:
“Early on January 1st, 2026, we had a pricing and inventory issue on our US website that has received a large amount of public notice.
In this specific situation, our US website showed incorrect stock availability and pricing for a specific memory kit that we no longer manufacture. Within hours, we received thousands of orders for this out-of-stock item. By January 2nd, the issue on the website was corrected and we began notifying customers that their orders would be canceled and a coupon code was included.
Unfortunately, the email template used incorrectly listed the expiration date for the included 15% off coupon. Within a few hours of that email on January 2nd, a corrected coupon for 40% off any in-stock memory kit was sent to those same customers as a correction.
The way we communicated and managed this issue does not meet our standards, and we regret confusing our customers with multiple posts and emails. This should have been a single communication, one time, with the correct discount code. For that, we apologize.
We made a mistake, and while we strive to minimize them, the next best thing we can do is resolve them as quickly and clearly as possible. We have made several changes to our process that will address these issues in the future, and we appreciate your patience.
We are and have always been focused and committed to the core customers – gamers, creators, performance users, and enthusiasts. We make parts for people who want to build fast, reliable computers. That has not changed.”
PC graphics card manufacturer ZOTAC has also now joined this party. Posts from buyers on Reddit who purchased RTX 50 series graphics cards via ZOTAC’s webstore state their orders have also been cancelled, only for the same models to be reposted at higher prices. The new prices jumped by an average of $500, and the only notification from ZOTAC to its customers was that it regretfully had to cancel their order due to a “system error that affected the processing of your purchase,” and that the customer could place the order again once the “error” had been fixed.
It seems obvious that both Corsair and ZOTAC, and would be PC part buyers, are now caught in the maelstrom created by the current memory chip supply shortage. This storm has firmly landed on shore now across the globe, causing prices to surge at never-before-seen rates, and from retailers to manufacturers, its effects are just beginning to be felt. Famed hardware overclocker Roman “der8auer” Hartung and Hardwareluxx have stated that NVIDIA has effectively ended its Open Price Program, which provided GPU and memory kits to its partners at MSRP, and could be why ZOTAC, which often provides custom cards at MSRP, has employed these seemingly shady tactics.
Folks on the hunt for their next hardware upgrade should be used to seeing similar situations with product price increases happening out of the blue on online marketplaces such as Amazon or Newegg, with scalpers constantly seeking the highest profits they can get, but such behavior is rare at manufacturer webstores. Sadly, though, this could be just the beginning as manufacturers adapt to a constantly changing supply chain regarding any products that rely on memory chips.
Discussion (19 replies)
Join Discussion →I saw this as well. Just makes me trust an Amazon over any distinct manufacturer.
Right now Corsair and Zotac are on my shit list. Corsair slightly less so.
I never liked Zotac. Their GPUs are the cheapest in my region and never once did I feel the need to get even a RTX 5050 because they have a reputation of using crappy thermal solution and their fans are noisy and die early. I do have a Zotac 3090 I bought used for $652 but the seller had it repasted and replaced all the thermal pads and the temps under load seemed nothing to be concerned about. Plus, that story where Zotac support told the user they could throw their card away at no charge...man, how scummy and desperate must they be for making a few dollars at the expense of their customers!
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Zotac is at the top of my shitlist right now. And I'm always eyeballing a 5090... it's a problem lol.
Corsair slightly less so because they have made some people right that got caught up in their markup extravaganza.
Corsair is the worst offender on the Reddit PC subs, for doing DDR owners dirty on RMAs. Zotac has always been :poop: tier.
I think it is easy and simplistic to lash out at Corsair and Zotac. I am not dismissing or forgetting any behavior just keeping perspective that those companies and many others are also victims of the AI boom and greedy chip makers.
GEEZE - I just AI'd how long and how much to open a new fab. Takes twice as long in the US too.
12-18 months in Taiwan
4.5-5 years in the US
25+ billion US $ for state of the art facilities
The problem here isn't that Zotac and Corsair are raising prices. If they are taking orders ahead of production without a contract signed for supplies to meet the demand of sed production already on contract at negotiated rates (as is expected) then pricing their goods based on those rates then they are bad at business.
What I suspect is happening here is they have done exactly that and have established costs but are profiteering in the worst way possible and cancelling standing orders at the lower cost because the market at large currently demands a higher cost.
So they are increasing their profit on orders already sold by cancelling them and forcing customers to re-order or simply not buy from them.
In this case they are the worst kind of vendor and need to be called out for it.
"System Error" is their fall back excuse. It's all about greed IMO.
The others will be fine but I hope you die, Zotac. HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Soooo you DON'T like Zotac? ;)
Igor right now -
What makes you think the others will be fine? EVGA bailing out was the herald of things to come. It has become a battle of attrition for the AIBs.
I've tried 2 Zotac (a 4090 and 5090) cards in recent years and both worked out for me but it took decades of folks that I personally know who had good experiences with them before I was willing to take that chance because I too felt there was something cheap about them. I will say the ones I got honestly performed admirably and I have no regrets with them and I think they do have a feel of quality when you hold them. I say this because I was expecting them to feel cheap and use lightweight plastic, and be overall flimsy but that was not the case with the models I got.
That aside, yeah, this is some seriously shady crap stuff going on but I'm not so sure everyone will be fine if they bow out. I'm not okay with what they've done recently by any means and plan to boycott them unless they imrpove, that is if I ever buy another GPU which is starting to look doubtful. On the other hand, Corsair doesn't deserve a free ride either because there were a lot of people who got screwed when their orders got canceled and they did the same thing as Zotac.
We've already seen EVGA fall and the US market doesn't have as nearly many options as they do in Asia. I am very concerned because if they go we're essentially left with MSI/GIGABYTE/ASUS. Does anyone remember the last time they bought a GPU from PNY? Am I forgetting anyone else?
I keep hoping GALAX will fully return to the U.S. but the closest that's happened are with their more vanilla models and not the fancy high end monsters exclusively offered in Asia. I've done a few posts on these over the years, heavily OCd, liquid cooled, and custom BIOS, basically the kind of stuff we been seeing more of from ASUS recently but GALAX has been doing for years. They've had some beastly 3090, 4090, and 5090 models
Point is, until NV and AMD start being abundantly clear about what's happening, we have a growing void regarding graphics card manufacturers and it looks like it could get a whole lot worse.
This is exactly what came first to my mind too.
Just spitballing below-
As has been discussed here before; Nvidia is likely thinking, the sooner the masses are on a Geforce NOW subscription, the better. They can have Foxconn churn out the GPUs for it. Their partnership with MediaTek could be heading that direction? Devices to play anywhere, especially the cloud? I have probably missed tons of relevant news blurbs pertaining to these things.
The AIBs can survive on table scaps, or not. That Q report came out showing gaming was single digits revenue. Then the presentation where he mention gaming once for barely a hot second. And even that was to push AI. The latest shots fired- "relentless negativity" and "doomer narratives" surrounding artificial intelligence are "not helpful to society" and have caused damage"
Leather jacket man with too many spatulas does not need gamers anymore. The push into robotics is much more important now. But getting gamers on a subscription that provides steady monthly revenue, is certainly money they won't leave on the table.
Jeff and Elon have their moonshots, somewhat literally. Jensen seems focused on Skynet. :p
I've had a few Zotac GPU's and they always worked well with no problems.
Fewer companies, selling fewer things, but for more money a pop, and line keeps going up.
Seems to be the theme of the 2020's...