[GamersNexus] The Death of Affordable Computing | Tariffs Impact & Investigation
londontko
Member
The outrage over tariffs is always louder than the understanding of them. There are only a few outcomes: prices rise and consumers pay; prices rise and demand drops; or businesses adapt—cut costs, reshore production, or find alternatives. That's how markets work. Tariffs are leverage, not punishment. And if other countries drop theirs, the U.S. will too. It's reciprocal by design. This isn't oppression—it's negotiation. The only people calling it fascism are the ones who mistake globalism for gospel and can't fathom America acting in its own interest.
IntentionalPun
Ask me about my wife's perfect butthole
For all the "it's already bad" posts, it's about to get a lot worse (unless they are dropped of course, but it's so unclear WTF is going on lol) It's not just tariff's either, the shipping costs of anything coming by boat from China, on a Chinese made ship or even by companies that have a single Chinese made ship have skyrocketed too.
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londontko
Member
Also, let's not lose the plot. The idea that China is in a stronger position to weather U.S. tariffs is delusional. Their economy is pegged to the dollar, they're one of the biggest holders of U.S. debt, and most of their global trade runs through a system built and dominated by America. They can posture, redistribute trade to Europe, flash their BRICS logo around—but they can't escape the reality: the U.S. is the largest consumer market on the planet, and the dollar is still king. You're watching a soap opera, and the script was written decades ago.
Sgt. Pinback
(L3) + (R3) | Spartan rage activated
MikeM
Member
I have funding I manage on 50 year amortizations from the 70s and see these interest rates. Problem is back then, you could finish high school and work almost anywhere and be a single income household and figure it out. Today- lol.
Kings always fall. Depends if Trump derails that train now or not.
We have seen where the US is vulnerable- borrowing rates. Dump some treasuries and all those DOGE billions saved goes down the drain and then some.
Problem is that the US thought it could bully the world, but the world is so integrated that leaving the US behind is fairly easy. Globalism working as designed.
Gaiff
SBI’s Resident Gaslighter
Shadowstar39
Member
Dude why aren't your kids buying their own or using your hand me downs? I don't even buy myself a 4k TV or monitor as my 1080p 55" and new $120 27" are fine. My base ps5 and pc with 3060ti, 5700x 32gb ram is doing just fine. The gpu was 450 right before covid and since I'm a 1080p user I max out everything.
Unless you are wealthy, why spoil kids? They then get ungrateful and expect it. Mine got a ds or a psp. Maybe a 10 year old laptop when I upgraded. They were happy to have that. If they wanted anything more they took turns on my desktop.
People don't realize going to 4k makes it all unaffordable. Meanwhile, outside of Nvidias shit gpu prices I'm still paying 2014 prices for stuff.
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MacReady13
Member
My eldest is 15. Finding a job isn't quite as easy as we all thought it might be for a 15 year old. Then I have a 13, 11 and 6 year old. As for hand me downs, I have 1 gaming PC. They aren't getting Dad's gaming PC!!!
BacklashWave534
Member
This was an Nvidia problem far before it was a tariff problem. They are the company that has been making PC gaming unaffordable for several years. They could have set contractual agreements that stopped manufacturers (ASUS, MSI, etc) from price gouging but they didn't. They could have also had better protection against scalpers but they didn't. This is what happens when a company has no competition. They simply don't care.
londontko
Member
Kings always fall? Sure. Eventually. But if you think dumping Treasuries is a clever way to strike at the U.S., you clearly don't understand who gets burned worse—spoiler: it's the seller. The dollar is still the global reserve, and Treasuries are still the most trusted safe-haven asset.
As for "leaving the U.S. behind"? Integrated doesn't mean optional. It means interdependent. The U.S. isn't just some player on the board—it built the board, set the rules, and still controls the currency everyone's forced to play with.
You don't overthrow the house while you're still paying rent in their currency.
Crayon
Member
Look at the companies they are talking to in the video.
CobraAB
Member
Stupid freaking GPU prices alone have made it hard to afford. Certainly if you want to do a full new build.
I did manage to get a PNY 5070 at MSRP at Microcenter in Houston.
Yeah, I know the reviews are not great but geez, landing one at retail prices is a bit a win.
It's fine for me.
I did manage to get a PNY 5070 at MSRP at Microcenter in Houston.
Yeah, I know the reviews are not great but geez, landing one at retail prices is a bit a win.
It's fine for me.
Rentahamster
Rodent Whores
LavitzSlambert
Member
Good watch while waiting for Switch 2 preorders.
DenchDeckard
Moderated wildly
care to elaborate?
I think everyone gets it from that post.
Nikodemos
Member
Price gouging? You mean the thing they did when they released Titan and Titan Black editions of various cards? Oh, no wait, that was rentseeking, my bad. I forgot which corporate rip-off scheme is which.
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You're only scratching the basic surface of that. I mean I always harp on how people should just break down and take econ 101 and 102 since so many people are basically economically illiterate.(Including tech-tubers) Yeah econ 102 would have pretty much told you tariffs and price controls are bad idea yet people keep wanting to try them.(Oh and most people want to use labor theory of value when pretty much subjective theory of value is what you should be using.)
Hot5pur
Member
I would say 4K gaming is very expensive now and not worth it on PC.
At 1080P you can still build something reasonably priced.
Personally I probably spend more time on the deck these days, smaller quick games make a bit more sense if you are a bit older.
I also think semiconductor technology is hitting massive bottlenecks and you need many 6 figure engineers to keep pushing that shit (Lam, Applied Materials, ASML, TSMC), the sad part is it feels like engine coders are getting worse and relying more on DLSS and framegen to make their games performant. Makes it so that your GPU is actually worse then it could be because of lazy optimization, granted games are also a hell of a lot more complex, probably.
At 1080P you can still build something reasonably priced.
Personally I probably spend more time on the deck these days, smaller quick games make a bit more sense if you are a bit older.
I also think semiconductor technology is hitting massive bottlenecks and you need many 6 figure engineers to keep pushing that shit (Lam, Applied Materials, ASML, TSMC), the sad part is it feels like engine coders are getting worse and relying more on DLSS and framegen to make their games performant. Makes it so that your GPU is actually worse then it could be because of lazy optimization, granted games are also a hell of a lot more complex, probably.
DragonNCM
Member
It is ok......just don't get hit with the dong.....
MikeM
Member
If the US wants to equally burn the rules down that it built up, the world will move on. The US is not infallible- that would be some mighty American exceptionalism there.
Unless you are playing on some massive screens, 4k is largely unnecessary. I run a 4k 65" TV and a 27" 1440p monitor- I couldn't justify the increased pixel density on such a small screen relative to frametime cost.
PeteBull
Member
bigdad2007
Member
It's been before the pandemic. Prices never went down since crypto became a thing. Crypto mining/nfts kind of dried up so AI became the new buzzword for Nvidia to pump up its price.
I miss the golden age of PC gaming back for when for like $700 you could built a PC that smoked consoles.
panda-zebra
Member
Pretty much that. But it's also well worth making the time to watch the whole thing to see basically the same interview play out over and over with the different participants when you can see how the broadly similar core of the situation affects each in slightly different ways based on their circumstances. The Canadian business opening up a plant in the US, already well aware of what can and cannot be reasonably manufactured in the country having spent years planning these steps. The two PC builders, neighbours in the same location who each serve approximately the same number of customers over the course of a year, yet one has the luxury of being able to rely on existing business undertaken outside the US while the other reasonably cannot when it amounts to just 10-20% of what they do. Then other larger and smaller businesses each with their own specific circumstances, but universally all with the underlying major concern over stability through a period when things weren't just changing day-to-day but by the hour... having to do business, make important decisions affecting the next 3, 6, 12 months and beyond when the landscape is constantly shifting and the wrong decisions could bring it all crashing down.
They were all on the same page in saying it's the small to medium sized businesses that will suffer the most through this and all answered the same user feedback questions/comments offered by the presenter in exactly the same way, shooting down the obvious common misconceptions and misunderstandings with the same simple facts. But it was all brought into focus for me by the New York businessman who packed up and moved to Texas in the past in search of more stability and predictability in how he could conduct his business, and that's exactly what each of the interviewees spoke about in regards to the effects of tariffs - he didn't shift locations because he knew he'd make more money (he doesn't, he says he makes less) but the conditions under which he can conduct his business offer more stability and predictability and that's all important. Some sort of better the devil you know scenario, he effectively says it's better to operate under "worse" rules, regulation and conditions that are known, unshifting and can be planned for, rather than roll dice with the future of his business, and the livelihoods of his workforce, which is what it's been like the past few weeks and months in all the turbulence.
panda-zebra
Member
Like the sweary NY guy in the video said - why would he go back to making less when he's experienced and knows he's able to make more? Retailers think like this, Nvidia definitely thinks like this. Market forces only do so much as I found with my own business and prices charged by importers after covid.
Look at the guys offering very cheap cases, effectively "loss leaders" to build their brand. Just about scraping a negligible technical profit that tariffs don't just wipe out, but result in a product costing twice the price to the consumer or a huge loss for the business itself... yet who doesn't lose out here? The government with the tax collection, obviously, but apparently only the retailers in terms of the product cycle, as they operate on a percentage basis not a unit basis, so the more things cost, the greater their whack on top.
And then look at those PC builders again, see what the effect of having to manufacture just the case in the US would be (if that really is the intended goal behind what looks suspiciously like a national-level VAT on imports) as that imported $100 case becomes a $390 case or a $450 case... over half the price of that golden age console-smoking PC in just the box everything gets dropped into.
existensmaximum
Member
Since we're using computers for pretty much all kind of work in the west, I can only assume that prices for both products, services and everything else will also be affected.
Madserb2023
Member
The cost of computers hss been rising for at least a decade now. Its largely down to the fact that Chinese wages have gone up by about 10 times and not having an emergence of a second China. India just simply isn't industrialising at the same rate. Its definitely political because economics never used to be reduced to one thing. Tariffs are just a tax. A lot people don't understand but duty is another name for tariff, and in Europe especially, duty on things like oil is very high as to why petrol prices are higher. The price of electronics will continue to be higher in Europe because of sales taxes, duties, regulations irrespective of tariffs due to economics.
dotnotbot
Member
It's a "tax" that has to be paid upfront by most companies except biggest ones, that is one of the many issues outlined in the video. (And importing lower quantities also causes prices to go up.)
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PaintTinJr
Gold Member
I think the problem with the data for drawing a conclusion about: who could weather a tariff storm better, Is massively distorted by the US GDP being skewed by the TOP 10% spending 40-50% of that GDP - not representing the average American - and the higher defence spending than other competing economies.
In a tariff war that ends up being fought on consumption, all the other nations with lower debt to GDP ratios, superior distribution of wealth and more of their GDP made up by social and welfare spending, and their populous' with more personal savings would have their average citizen better placed to take advantage of consumption opportunities...say in the event China ate margin in contract manufacturing to let globalised companies offer non-US markets cheaper pricing to stimulate consumption, at that point where non-US regions were booming and the US was effectively in recession for the average American - even if skewed stats that said otherwise - I could only really see the Dollar being the reference currency of the world economy as a remaining advantage for the US economy in a tariff war, assuming China was effectively maintaining a status-quo in context.
I'm sure for billionaires or millionaires weathering the storm would be profitable wherever, but I don't believe the average American would be at an advantage if even at parity - with citizens of other markets.
The disruption the PC market has already shown in the video looks worrying IMO, although if Microsoft still pull the ripcord on Win 10 support in a few months at a time when death of affordable PCs looks real, and spending on new PC parts currently looks like a gambling trip to a race track, maybe that would suggest that this is just a temporary blip.
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Buggy Loop
Member
Jumped on 5070Ti at MSRP in Canada when I saw Canada computers having inventory because things go to shit.
Should be set for a while, hopefully while this whole mess blow over but I don't think prices will magically come down either
Should be set for a while, hopefully while this whole mess blow over but I don't think prices will magically come down either
StereoVsn
Gold Member
National VAT, with appropriate amount of money going to the States to replace Sales Tax, would make a ton more sense vs the stupidity that is ongoing.
Because it could be planned for, exports would get a refund, and so on. And it would raise revenue to pay for the $trillions more if tax cuts Republicans are pushing that are going to go right into national debt.
Madserb2023
Member
The issue is that, when I did my economics diploma, about dozen things go into pricing with tariffs being one of. For example regulations increase costs. In Europe, food is more expensive than the US mainly due to regulations. We outright ban certain American agricultural products let alone make them artificially more expensive through tarriffs but I never heard that viewed negatively here. Was always seen as necessary evil to protect European agriculture. One of the reasons why Ukraine's admission to the EU is even rejected by Poland. Obviously our increased fuel costs due to tarriffs have for long time increased transportation costs which is also why stuff is more expensive. I guarantee you that consoles etc will be more expensive in Europe than the US even without tarriffs due to everything else that effects prices that has literally been forgotten since 2025.
nowhat
Member
Pumping lifestock full with antibiotics is a bad practice and should be discouraged. It raises the emergence of bacteria resistant to antibiotics. Which is another shitshow.
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Madserb2023
Member
The point is s simple one. Tarriffs are an economic tool like any other that has been used. Tarriffs were historically used to rebuild European industry after WW2 so it didn't get destroyed by American competition. The EU was set up as a tariff zone originally. To being something that tries to control spending habits. About 50% if a tobacco product is a tarriff and so on. It has always been a nuanced thing. The problem is that because Trump is decisive, it has created a black and white view. If Trump is for it then its bad. I work in imports and exports into the EU and the company I work for spends millions on import duties, and it does increase costs. However it was never a zero sum thing till now. You can easily argue for tarriffs on steal. Can't not have a steel industry. Worth the increased cost at a time of war. Definitely costing Europe now. Lucky to build a tank a month. Tarriffs have an economic balancing effect like interest rates.
MikeM
Member
Which model did you land?
Buggy Loop
Member
Gigabyte windforce OC
SFF, which actually for this gen of card is equivalent to beefy ampere cards as it is the same dimension as my old 3080 Ti Asus TUF
Super good undervolt, 2.8GHz 850mV. ~55C in an SFF case (Meshilicious) and silent, much more silent than my old card. No coil whine. Silicon lottery and all but I'm very satisfied.
Not worth spending another >$300 for thicker coolers for 5070Ti
londontko
Member
That's a lot of word soup to say: "America bad, China maybe better, everything's complicated, so don't expect a clear point."
Let's start with the obvious: yes, U.S. GDP is disproportionately influenced by the top 10%... That's not some hidden flaw—it's a direct result of being the world's largest, most consumption-driven economy. And those "unequal" consumers dictate global manufacturing priorities. That's called 'leverage' and it's a positive.
Second, your glowing praise of welfare spending and personal savings as signs of resilience is laughable. You think China's middle class is better positioned because they hoard more cash? Wait until the CCP stops smothering inflation and lets reality in the front door. A bloated welfare budget and higher personal savings don't make your average citizen more "resilient." They make them dependent and stagnant.
As for the fantasy of China "eating margin" to flood non-U.S. markets—they've tried. It doesn't work. No country, or even combination of them, replaces U.S. demand 1:1.
And let's not pretend anyone is realistically dethroning the dollar. There is no viable alternative with the liquidity, depth, and trust to match it. It's not just unlikely—it's structurally impossible.
PaintTinJr
Gold Member
It feels like your response wasn't quite inline with what I wrote, particularly in reference to the dollar, so to reiterate it, and try make it the simpler point I intended,
There is over 500 million people in the EU (including the UK), and there is 342m Americans, with wealth distribution better in the EU and average wages higher excluding the Top 10% of wealthy individuals which represents the volume of consumption(the market) my assertion is that the GDP of the part of the market that really matters to the success of companies targeting the masses - and providing the most employment - is superior from EU+UK, and the numbers I', using to make that point should seem pretty simple and obvious even if we say one US family is spending 20% more on average - via debt - than EU families, there is effectively closer to 1.5 x the population in the EU+UK, that on average have a higher standard of living - because of greater wealth distribution.
Against the simplicity of real consumers per nation x population x real average income spent on volume goods, the claim the US is the biggest market for issues that these tariffs will most impact feels far from a certainty IMO.
londontko
Member
You've cobbled together population stats and wage curves and somehow arrived at the conclusion that the EU+UK is the true engine of global consumption...
Yes, the EU has more people. That's not the same as having more consumers. Americans spend more, buy faster, and do it on credit with the kind of blind optimism that built entire industries. You think evenly distributed mediocrity is better for business than concentrated, debt-fueled demand? Tell that to Apple. Or Amazon. Or literally any brand that launches in the U.S. before remembering Europe exists.
And invoking 'wealth distribution' like it somehow translates to purchasing power... Europe flattens the curve—right into lower margins, smaller scale, and sluggish growth. Bravo.
Your "real consumers x population x income" formula sounds like something a committee wrote to justify a subsidy. But it collapses under one truth: global companies don't give a shit about spreadsheets. They care about sales. And they chase the U.S. market for a reason.
This is America, baby. You better up your dose.
HoodWinked
Member
Pretty nice deal right now on Newegg for a barebones that I found on slickdeals.
$344
Ryzen 9600X
Gigabyte B650M MATX motherboard
500GB M.2 drive
Corsair 32GB Ram
Monster Hunter Wilds
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kiphalfton
Member
Looks like somebody drank the orange kool-aid
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Crayon
Member
You keep stopping short of saying this tariff strategy is good. If you think it is, point me in the direction of a coherent argument because i've been looking without much luck. "case for tariffs" "tariffs are good" "debate tariffs". Either my searches suck or the algorithm is fighting me. Link anything that makes this make sense.
BackBackPunch
Member
Are you still talking about tariffs?
That shit is over. Everything is back except for China.
Nothing has went up in price in the US. I don't think it's going to. What's it like living life as a doomer? Honestly good for you to anyone buying this but prices are the same in the US. What do you think is up? When do you think these magical new prices will start? Soon? 2 weeks?
You want a sneak preview?
Go wander around your house and look for the "Made in China" label. Unless those China tariffs go away, once all the US warehouse inventory runs out, everything with that label is going to be more than twice as expensive as it used to be. You need a microwave that used to cost $400? Now it's $1000. That's not some imaginary number. That's what it's gonna cost, real-world, real-soon...
PaintTinJr
Gold Member
Data is data, or should I prefer no data with a "trust me bro"? No, thanks.
Or we could take a volume high ticket item like the iPhone - as representative for average people - and despite market share being at least 5% higher in the US compared to the old EU28, in real population handset consumers - excluding under 7year olds - CoPilot is estimating 171m in the US versus 209m in the EU28, so in absolute numbers 30-40m more in the EU28 market, even if those consumer sales have more friction because the EU28 isn't a flat standardized market grid like the US, the revenue/profit for companies like Apple will still equate to parity in a worst case, if not a slight advantage for EU28 demand IMO.
Alternatively look at every day volume items like medicines from pharmaceutical companies that need assured sales to fund them. The buying power of the tiny UK NHS far exceeds that of American retailers (AFAIK) that result in drugs costing up to 10x, but typically 2x, 4x less even for common volume drugs for conditions like Diabetes (in the UK) because of the consistent large scale orders placed. And because it is social welfare funded these sales are largely indifferent of economic times, meaning this volume consumption wouldn't be impacted by tariffs in the way they would outside the old EU28.
These are just example to give an idea of the comparative consumption size and stability in the old EU28 when you actually look at typical consumers that might be looking to build a PC with spare money in a tariff war and whether they are needing to redirect more money towards healthcare - as an example - or towards their US company consumer goods made and exported from China to Germany - like iPad, Switch 2, Corsair memory/case or an AMD/Nvidia CPU/GPU.