In recent news, the AMD Radeon video card market is facing a significant shortage due to a surge in demand in China. This shortage is compounded by the rising cost of Bitcoin and Ethereum, leading to increased mining activity.
Miners are depleting all available reserves and rumors suggest that the upcoming production of Zen 5 processors could double performance compared to Zen 4, further exacerbating the deficit.
Cryptocurrency mining is known for its high resource costs such as electricity, water, and land. Now, miners are increasingly purchasing AMD Ryzen processors, particularly the Ryzen 9 7950x, sought after for its support of AVX2 and AVX512 instructions crucial for mining efficiency.
The 7950X processors are proving to be a more cost-effective option compared to NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 video cards, partly due to their higher price point. The situation is expected to worsen with the mass production of Zen 5 processors.
Reports indicate that Zen 5 processors will be manufactured at TSMC between April and June, with mass production set for the following quarter. The main models of Zen 5 will feature Nirvana cores, while chips for high-demand segments will boast Zen 5C Prometheus cores.
Miners are particularly interested in the new AMD chips for their doubled AVX512 performance over Zen 4. Additionally, an export of NVIDIA RTX 4090 V cards to China has resulted in a shortage of AMD Radeon graphics cards in the region.