New versions of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080, GeForce RTX 3070 and GeForce RTX 3060 Ti graphics cards have all added cryptocurrency mining limiters to curb their appeal to the digital money hungry

Now, Nvidia has announced that based on the mining limiter added to the GeForce RTX 3060, the aforementioned cards will be prevented from being snapped up by crypto miners Nvidia says, "We believe that this additional step will help us to offer better prices and more We believe this will put GeForce cards into the hands of gamers everywhere"

This new hash limiter will not affect cards currently on the market These new hash-limited cards will begin shipping in late May This may make finding a place to buy the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 a little easier once more inventory arrives

"Since these GPUs were originally released at full hashrate, we want to make sure customers know exactly what they are getting when they purchase a GeForce product," Matt Wuebbling, Global Head of GeForce Marketing at Nvidia stated To help with this, our GeForce partners display the 'Lite Hash Rate' (LHR) identifier on GeForce RTX 3080, RTX 3070, and RTX 3060 Ti cards This identifier will appear on the retail product listing and box

Note that Nvidia does not mention the RTX 3090, which is twice as expensive; the $1,500 card does not appear to have a limiter, which is probably a good thing given that the card is so expensive Nvidia does not want expensive purchases to be limited It is likely that the company has received pushback from enthusiast miners The rumored upcoming GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is also likely to enable LHR

With the value of Bitcoin and Ethereum skyrocketing due to the Covid-19 craze, Nvidia's latest graphics cards have become the model tool for mining cryptocurrencies And not just professional miners Even the average consumer who gets a card believes that using the new GPUs for mining can recoup the cost within a few months, depending on the amount

Nvidia offers a Crypto Mining Processor (CMP) that is ideal for mining Unfortunately, these cards do not push graphics

The continuing impact of the Covid-19 pandemic will continue to make the RTX 3080 inventory disaster an ever-lasting nightmare for gamers It is not just computer hardware that has been affected by the manufacturing woes in Korea, Taiwan, and China, but everything from iPads to automobiles

According to Dr CC Wei, CEO of Taiwanese chipmaker TSMC, chip manufacturing will not be able to keep up with demand until at least 2022 or 2023 or later TSMC is working on building new manufacturing facilities, and Taiwan is working to divert water from farmers so it can produce silicon Taiwan is doing everything it can, including diverting water away from farmers so that they can produce silicon