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The report highlights that black Friday deal rush, I bought a fresh graphics card. That was nine months ago, and I think it might be the last time — at least for the foreseeable future — that I’ll get a decent price on any computer devices. In this week’s issue of Boost Mode, I’ll brag a little about my find, and explain why something that good is unlikely to come again any time soon. In November, around the U.S.
In a fresh development, every week I share my insights on PC tech industry, desktop setups, and devices optimization. I also track down some of the most interesting PC and nerd news from around the web, plus a PC system update pick you might not have seen elsewhere. Want this newsletter to come directly to your inbox? Sign up on our website! Welcome to the Boost Mode newsletter.
As part of the ongoing story, it was an RTX 5070 Ti, a card with an official price of $750 USD from Nvidia, on sale for $637.49. Why the discount? It was an “Open Box” item — someone had bought it and returned it, and Zotac certified it as working and good enough to sell again. Incidentally, that’s why I didn’t write up the deal for PCWorld: We’re okay with refurbished most of the time, but most people balk at open box items. First of all, a special thank you to SlickDeals forum user N3RD_01, who spotted this deal on Zotac’s official web store.
Industry observers note that but that $100+ discount wasn’t the only factor to consider. The same user who posted the deal pointed out that you could combine it with a PayPal holiday offer — the publisher’s “Pay in 4” system, split up the price over four payments with no interest. At the time, If I bought the card via PayPal and used that option, I could save an additional 20 percent as a rebate to my PayPal balance. I was a little worried, too.
As part of the ongoing story, it also came with a two-year warranty, and buying directly from Zotac meant that it would be easy enough to claim if something was off with the devices. That brought the effective price down to $510, for a $750 card that was often hard to find for under a grand.
The report highlights that after three months I’d paid it off, and it’s a worthy upgrade over the 3070 I’d been using since 2021. A happy ending for a PC gamer, right? Combined with my desktop’s existing Ryzen 7800X3D and 64GB of RAM, I’ve got a setup that should last me years and years before fresh platform releases start to actually push its performance limits. I couldn’t resist, and I pulled the trigger.
According to the latest update, it’s going for $1300, a $550 increase over the $750 list price from November. Ouch. (Though I’ll point out that you can find a 5070 Ti a little cheaper elsewhere.) A mid-range, pre-built tech industry desktop that I recommended for a friend at around the same time was $1000, which I considered a good deal. That same machine is now $1500, a straight 50 percent increase. Similar price jumps are happening across the industry. For the sake of comparison, I checked the current price on that same Zotac RTX 5070 Ti.
The report highlights that that’s causing a lot of other problems, too, but the primary one for my job is that it’s causing a K-shaped split in the PC market, as affordable computers get less and less powerful, and powerful computers get more and more expensive. You probably know that RAM and storage prices are incredibly inflated, about 500 percent over what they were just a year ago, because of manufacturer demand from “AI” data centers.
The report highlights that smaller manufacturers like Framework are being squeezed to the breaking point, and even giants like Lenovo and Dell are struggling. If recent reports are accurate, memory manufacturing capacity is already sold out for all of 2027. So even if the “AI” bubble pops today, we’re in for a year or more of wildly inflated prices. Other firms, notably the China-based CXMT, are trying to fill the manufacturing vacuum. But that might just slow the price problems, not reverse them. Nvidia, AMD, and the “big three” memory producers are raking in literally trillions of dollars, but the broader PC market is suffering.
In a fresh development, the one I bought has 16GB of GDDR7 memory, a luxury I would have thought ridiculous a few years ago…but 8GB of graphics memory is now a little spare for the most recent AAA platform releases. So the supply of fresh cards is going down as data centers gobble up manufacturing capacity. That’s why the prices have gone up. And it won’t stop with the memory that goes into graphics cards — data centers need chips too, many of them made by Nvidia, AMD, and Intel. So the GPUs themselves are next on the chopping block. Speedy memory is a core component of graphics cards, of course.
According to the latest update, cPUs are being affected as data centers keep being expanded. Motherboard sales are going down as PC builders strap in for the rough market. Even technology as niche as hard drives — the spinning discs most consumers thought completely obsolete, unless they’re doing large data backups or building a NAS — are going up in price. It keeps getting worse.
Industry observers note that that’s the first time that any desktop card, at any price, has been sold with 4GB of memory since 2022. There has only been one major desktop graphics card disclosure in 2026: AMD’s Radeon RX 9050, which will be sold to PC manufacturers in configurations as low as 4GB.
The report highlights that suffice it to say, I’m glad I got in a pretty good round of PC upgrades in 2025, right before all this madness started snowballing. I’m not trying to boast here, I didn’t perform some masterful act of market prediction — I was just lucky enough to buy fresh devices at the right time. I could go on here.
Industry observers note that not much, I’m afraid. The best time to buy or upgrade a tech industry PC was 2025. The second-best time is now… even though now is absolutely awful. Because based on everything we’ve seen and all the expert analysis, prices will keep rising for all of 2027, and possibly beyond. If you’re not in a position to buy powerful PC devices now…then I’d focus on getting through that tech industry backlog, or maybe sticking to fresh indie platform releases that aren’t looking to wow you with visual splendor. What advice can I offer?
The report highlights that there are dozens of them across the series. You could also look into services like GeForce NOW or Shadow to offload the devices to a streaming setup, though that’s leaning into some of the “own nothing and be happy” doomerism that’s making the rounds. Here I’ll mention that every year I recommend a great collection of fresh PC platform releases that you can play on low-power devices.
As part of the ongoing story, i like D&D. I hear birdwatching is big with the kids. And I used to think that kayaking and photography were prohibitively expensive at high levels. But I could sell my desktop PC right now, and buy a brand fresh sea kayak and a real camera to take photos of birds on it. Or maybe just…find another hobby for a while.
As part of the ongoing story, food for thought. Here’s one that I took on the Delaware River.
In a fresh development, lucky for me, the folks who made that system update also make other platform releases. Like this one! Windblown is a top-down combat system update in the same vein as Hades, but about twice as fast. And you play as tiny, adorable animals, wielding weapons that look like they’d throw your back out. I’ve had an itch for fast roguelike combat ever since I beat Dead Cells.
As part of the ongoing story, first, the vibes are immaculate. Despite the breakneck pace — the little critters are so fast they each have a jetpack — the global stage is calm and soothing. It also uses a weapon-switching mechanic that keeps you on your toes, constantly looking for the right combination of primary and secondary tools. Windblown does a couple of things I really like that set it apart from a sea of similar platform releases coming out right now.
In a fresh development, it’s $25 on Steam. The system update is in early access right now, but it’s got plenty to chew on, including deep co-op and screen-filling bosses.
As part of the ongoing story, to get my editorials, news picks, and system update recommendations delivered straight to your inbox, you can sign up for Boost Mode on the PCWorld Newsletter hub. Check out The Full Nerd, Prompt Mode for “AI” tips, Safe Mode to keep your PC and gadgets secure, and Smart Mode to boost your productivity. That’s all for this week.
The report highlights that on PCWorld he's the resident keyboard nut, always using a fresh one for a review and building a fresh mechanical board or expanding his desktop "battlestation" in his off hours. Michael's previous bylines include Android Police, Digital Trends, Wired, Lifehacker, and How-To Geek, and he's covered events like CES and Mobile Worldwide scene Congress live. Michael lives in Pennsylvania where he's always looking forward to his next kayaking trip. Michael is a 15-year veteran of technology journalism, covering everything from Apple to ZTE.