Hardware manufacturers removing game branding from AMD products?
If you have been following the recent GPP discussion, you might have noticed some new chatter on the web about yesterday’s Gigabyte release, their new RX 580 Gaming Box was released just as that, the "Gigabyte RX 580 Gaming Box", while the other two Nvidia versions are listed under the Aorus branding.
That was noticed by a number of users throughout the web, and raised a flag or two, could it have anything to do with the GPP discussion from Nvidia? E.g. separating and segmentation of brands, as Nvidia would require exclusivity from partners that sign up for the program. Earlier reports indicated NVIDIA’s condition for allowing partners into the GPP was that they exclusively reserve their gaming brands for GeForce cards, or else they couldn’t participate. Some users now have noticed that small changes are taking effect. Now let me write this in shouty words, it is NOT CONFIRMED, but Gigabyte MIGHT be separating Radeon cards to the Gigabyte brand and moving Nvidia cards into their separate Aorus brand, again unconfirmed as their website still shows both as an option.
It was also rumored that ASUS STRIX cards would not be available for Radeon products, in the USA there indeed seems to be low stock, likely (and I assume this) resulting in the products indeed not listed. However here in the EU, I can see full availability for anything Radeon branded with ROG / STRIX, the ASUS website shows everything to be normal, so we cannot see any changes taking effect on the ASUS side at this moment. So again, I am not seeing anything alarming.
For MSI there is something noticeable, the Radeon Gaming X series graphics cards are no longer listed on the global and EU websites, the USA website, however, is listing all cards as normal. So that is the one oddity I have found.
All three brands show volume availability here in the EU under all brands, Gaming X, Aorus and ROG STRIX. There is one more observation, at this time I am not certain if the ‘re-branding’ actually is in effect or if it is a result of a lot of speculation, however website ComputerBase received a communication from Gigabyte Europe as to why the RX 580 Gaming box did not carry AORUS branding as one would expect.
“The manufacturer states that the product is not gamer focused. This, however, is inconsistent with the product page, whose headings are ‘Turn Your Ultrabook to Gaming Platform’ and ‘Upgrade the Game Experience’.”
That reply is indeed a bit weird, a Radeon RX 580 is not considered to be a gaming product? We’ll follow this closely, but at this time we’ll need more facts and thus visually see noticeable branding changes to see if GPP partners are actually actively rebranding their products. The proof this far as mentioned on several forums and websites is just too thin. This could very simply be Gigabyte reorganizing, as they have been doing for many months now. I also do wonder, if this GPP discussion would not have surfaced on the web, would anyone even have noticed this? But small subtle changes like these do feed the speculation on the bigger social discussion platforms, often for valid reasons & reasoning.
Asus Radeon RX 580 STRIX edition with 8GB GDDR5 memory
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Senior Member
Posts: 2068
Joined: 2017-03-10
Well, there is Sapphire. I buy from them for years. They'll get more sales.
If it is confirmed that particular brand is cooking such thing on AMD, it will affect their other product sales as well.
Yeah, hopefully the AMD-specific OEMs can help counteract the impact of the GPP (assuming the worst-case interpretation is true). I've bought cards from Sapphire before, although my RX 580 is from MSI (I like the look of the Twin Frozr cooler). My Nvidia cards are almost always from EVGA, which is exclusively Nvidia, so I guess I can do the same with AMD and one of their exclusive OEMs. Perhaps this won't be as bad as it seems.
Senior Member
Posts: 11808
Joined: 2012-07-20
Thing is that I see nothing bad at brands which sell only from one manufacturer.
But idea that someone sells both camps and belittles one is disgusting. They are either proud of their product or they should not sell it.
It is similar to Lenovo selling AMD's APUs in horrible configurations crippling performance and more.
Because it is harming AMD as a brand.
Senior Member
Posts: 339
Joined: 2015-06-25
So long as these AMD "non-gaming" designs still feature all the bells and whistles that raise them above the reference design, I doubt it would make a difference.
I for one couldn't give a damn if my GPU didn't feature Gaming logos and RGB diodes all over the place so long as it performs well.
Senior Member
Posts: 3365
Joined: 2006-05-22
So long as these AMD "non-gaming" designs still feature all the bells and whistles that raise them above the reference design, I doubt it would make a difference.
I for one couldn't give a damn if my GPU didn't feature Gaming logos and RGB diodes all over the place so long as it performs well.
True, we as an enthusiast community are well informed and it wouldn't make a difference. However, you have a lot of folk out there who go online or in a store and they think there is a difference between X GPU and GAMING X GPU. In which case they hold more value to GAMING X GPU.
Sure we could educate them about being "marketed" but the truth is that brand hold value. And it does mean something to a PC gaming consumer.
Only time well tell where this leads to though.
Senior Member
Posts: 11808
Joined: 2012-07-20
Well, there is Sapphire. I buy from them for years. They'll get more sales.
If it is confirmed that particular brand is cooking such thing on AMD, it will affect their other product sales as well.