Three million add-in boards (AIBs) were sold to cryptocurrency miners in 2017
In a report published by Jon Peddie Research overall GPU shipments in the fourth quarter of 2017 decreased -1.5% from last quarter, however, the reports denotes that more than three million video cards have been sold to crypto miners in 2017, making AMD and Nvidia about $776 million.
It is also mentioned that the prices of video cards will not decrease short term, which in fact has recently been confirmed by Nvidia over at Massdrop. Prices would continue to rise during the second and third quarters, according to Nvidia. The shortage contributes to this.
-- JPR --
YEAR-TO-YEAR TOTAL GPU SHIPMENTS DECREASED -4.8%
Jon Peddie Research the industry’s market research firm reported that overall GPU shipments in the fourth quarter of 2017 decreased -1.5% from last quarter following normal seasonal shipments. Year-to-year total GPU shipments decreased -4.8%, desktop graphics decreased -2%, notebooks decreased -7%. Over 363 graphics units shipped in 2017.
AMD increased its market share 8.1%, Nvidia decreased -6%, and Intel decreased -2%.
Table 1: Graphics Chip Market shares |
Over three million add-in boards (AIBs) were sold to cryptocurrency miners worth $776 million in 2017. AMD was the primary benefactor of those sales.
Table 2: Graphics Chip Market |
The fourth quarter is typically flat to slightly up from the previous quarter in the seasonal cycles of the past. For Q4'17, it decreased -1.5% from last quarter and was above the ten-year average of -3.40%.
“Gaming has been and will continue to be the primary driver for GPU sales, augmented by the demand from cryptocurrency miners.,” said Dr. Jon Peddie, President of Jon Peddie research. We expect demand to slacken from the miners as margins drop in response increasingly utilities costs and supply and demand forces that drive up AIB prices. Gamers can offset those costs by mining when not gaming, but prices will not drop in the near future.”
Quick highlights
- AMD’s overall unit shipments increased 8.08% quarter-to-quarter, Intel’s total shipments decreased -1.98% from last quarter, and Nvidia’s decreased -6.00%.
- The attach rate of GPUs (includes integrated and discrete GPUs) to PCs for the quarter was 134% which was down -10.06% from last quarter.
- Discrete GPUs were in 36.88% of PCs, which is down -2.67%.
- The overall PC market increased 5.93% quarter-to-quarter, and decreased -0.15% year-to-year.
- Desktop graphics add-in boards (AIBs) that use discrete GPUs decreased -4.62% from last quarter.
- Q4'17 saw no change in tablet shipments from last quarter.
GPUs are traditionally a leading indicator of the market, since a GPU goes into every system before it is shipped, and most of the PC vendors are guiding cautiously for Q1’18. Findings include discrete and integrated graphics (CPU and chipset) for Desktops, Notebooks (and Netbooks). It does not include iPad and Android-based tablets, or ARM-based Servers, or x86-based servers. It does include x86-based tablets, Chromebooks, and embedded systems.
GPUs are traditionally a leading indicator of the market, since a GPU goes into every non-server system before it is shipped, and most of the PC vendors are guiding cautiously for Q4’14. The Gaming PC segment, where higher-end GPUs are used, was a bright spot in the market in the quarter.
For those who wish to understand the PC market, an understanding of the highly complex technology and ecosystem that has been built around the GPU is essential to understanding the market’s future directions.
The report contains the following content:
- Worldwide GPU and PC Shipment Volume, 1994 to 2020.
- Detailed worldwide GPU Shipment Volume, 1Q 2001 to 2Q 2016, and forecast to 2020.
- Major suppliers: Detailed market share data-on the shipments of AMD, Intel, Nvidia, and others.
- Financial results for the leading suppliers: Analysis of the quarterly results of the leading GPU suppliers
- Market Forecasts: You will also be able to download a detailed spreadsheet and supporting charts that project the supplier’s shipments over the period 2001 to 2018. Projections are split into platforms and GPU type.
- GPUs: History, Status, and Analysis.
- Financial History from for the last nine quarter: Based on historic SEC filings, you can see current and historical sales and profit results of the leading suppliers.
- A Vision of the future: Building upon a solid foundation of facts, data and sober analysis, this section pulls together all of the report's findings and paints a vivid picture of where the PC graphics market is headed.
- Charts, graphics, tables and more: Included with this report is an Excel workbook. It contains the data we used to create the charts in this report. The workbook has the charts and supplemental information.
Senior Member
Posts: 260
Joined: 2011-05-18
Actually, if you look at it from a purely technical point of view, mining is better than gaming. Gaming is just wasting energy to amuse you. On the other hand, how many of us have actually used a GPU until it stopped working due to degradation? All my old GPU's still work and the most of us buy a new one even before it's necessary. And before somebody says something like "I NEED to play in 4k @60 fps": no you don't. That, imo, is a luxury. f you want it, you have to pay for it.
On the other side, Nvidia and AMD are public companies with their shareholders. All that matters is market share and profit. The mining craze is making them a lot of profit and they would be really dumb to not take advantage of it. "Gaming has been and will continue to be the primary driver for GPU sales" was probably said by their PR. Try saying that to the shareholders and convince them to make less money because "you care about the gamer". You'll have to clear your desk in a heartbeat.
Senior Member
Posts: 3352
Joined: 2014-10-20
Actually, if you look at it from a purely technical point of view, mining is better than gaming. Gaming is just wasting energy to amuse you. On the other hand, how many of us have actually used a GPU until it stopped working due to degradation? All my old GPU's still work and the most of us buy a new one even before it's necessary. And before somebody says something like "I NEED to play in 4k @60 fps": no you don't. That, imo, is a luxury. f you want it, you have to pay for it.
On the other side, Nvidia and AMD are public companies with their shareholders. All that matters is market share and profit. The mining craze is making them a lot of profit and they would be really dumb to not take advantage of it. "Gaming has been and will continue to be the primary driver for GPU sales" was probably said by their PR. Try saying that to the shareholders and convince them to make less money because "you care about the gamer". You'll have to clear your desk in a heartbeat.
Crypto is most likely a short-term gold rush, gaming isn't. That's the whole difference, and they understand it. Hence all the hints pointing towards next release of Consumer GPU's / Mining GPU's.
If they focus only on profit and alienate consumers, this May result in a massive loss for them down the road. Yes, they care about shares, but they also care about sustainability which, IMO, Crypto doesn't offer.
Senior Member
Posts: 2325
Joined: 2017-11-23
Actually, if you look at it from a purely technical point of view, mining is better than gaming. Gaming is just wasting energy to amuse you. On the other hand, how many of us have actually used a GPU until it stopped working due to degradation? All my old GPU's still work and the most of us buy a new one even before it's necessary. And before somebody says something like "I NEED to play in 4k @60 fps": no you don't. That, imo, is a luxury. f you want it, you have to pay for it.
On the other side, Nvidia and AMD are public companies with their shareholders. All that matters is market share and profit. The mining craze is making them a lot of profit and they would be really dumb to not take advantage of it. "Gaming has been and will continue to be the primary driver for GPU sales" was probably said by their PR. Try saying that to the shareholders and convince them to make less money because "you care about the gamer". You'll have to clear your desk in a heartbeat.
Oh look, a miner...
Mining is wasting enormous amounts of energy to do what exactly? Farming some virtual currency... it doesn't contribute to ANYTHING, except gaining certain greedy individuals more wealth. But as with all currencies, it only has the value people believe it to have, and as it's just some niche, it will soon lose favor, and lose all value. I look forward to that day.
Senior Member
Posts: 12048
Joined: 2014-07-21
I might have not used them all until they were done for on a physical level, but I have 6 GPUs at home out of the 9 or 10 I ever had:
-Radeon 4850, basically has a hard time with youtube 1080p playback. Uses a lot of power and generates heat like no other card I ever had. No use for it for anybody
-2x 5770 that's of little use, it would be okay, but with AMD drivers I had trouble enough to get HDMI sound working so I bought a new GPU (like 5 years after release)
-580, yes that one was used until it was necessary to replace it because of graphical artifacts at stock usage
-960, runs in my HTPC (because of reused CPU without an iGPU I do need one there hehe)
-1080Ti, gaming card
-not to mention the 2x 980 I gave away to friends for free after less than two years of use, where they still do their work for GAMING

None of my cards ever was used for mining...
Did you use any GPUs until they were really done for, and found uses for your's after they no longer were really doing their gaming job? Not trying to bash you, just curious.
Senior Member
Posts: 12048
Joined: 2014-07-21
Well, in your opinion, which I share, I'm not trying to defend mining here. It's just that if you take a step back, seeing it from a production company's point of view, the "better" customer is the one just paying more, and that's basically the miners.
Yes they do degrade, the question is, because a card has degraded 5% it doesn't make it useless. Do I understand correctly if I say those cards lifetime is shortened, or did they reach 5-30% lower clocks because of power delivery wear down or something like that?