With the boom cryptocurrency is currently seeing, NVIDIA's high-end GPUs are in high demand from cryptocurrency miners in need of the processing power.
As this demand was interfering with gamers - already waging war with scalpers - from buying the latest graphics cards, NVIDIA announced it was implementing limits on the hash rate of the upcoming GeForce RTX 3060 card in a bid to prevent miners from buying up the 3060.
However, to the disappointment of many gamers eager to get their hands on other cards in the 30 Series, it appears these limits will remain solely on the 3060 for now.
30 Series will not face cryptomining restrictions
In a statement to PCMag, an NVIDIA spokesperson said that its plans for cryptocurrency mining restrictions are currently only for the RTX 3060 card. "We are focused on RTX 3060 currently," they said. "And we are not limiting the performance of GPUs already sold."
NVIDIA gave no explanation for why it was only focused on the RTX 3060. While retroactive limitations may be hard to implement on GPUs already sold, it is unclear why it could not utilise the same hash rate limits on upcoming restocks of the 30 Series cards.
This means that cryptocurrency miners will still target the more powerful RTX cards in the 30 Series - the 3060 Ti, 3070 and 3080. The line of GPUs has been on sale since late 2020, but remains out of stock alongside other tech products such as the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X.
However, perhaps NVIDIA are banking on another of its upcoming products to take the focus away from the RTX 30 Series...
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NVIDIA announced Cryptocurrency Mining Processor
In the blog post confirming that NVIDIA would place restrictions on the RTX 3060 GPU as to deter cryptocurrency miners, the company also announced it is manufacturing a new product- the Cryptocurrency Mining Processor (CMP) for those eager to mine Ethereum.
The CMP cards are designed specifically for those wanting to mine cryptocurrency. These GPUs will not feature any display outputs, for example, reducing the power needed to mine cryptocurrency when compared to the 30 Series line of graphics cards.
NVIDIA expects that its 30HX and 40HX CMP GPUs will be available this quarter, with the 50HX and 90HX products releasing in Q2. No pricing has yet been announced.
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