Nvidia makes GeForce RTX cards less desirable for crypto miners
It wants to make sure gamers can get the RTX 3080, RTX 3070 and RTX 3060 Ti.
Nvidia's new GeForce RTX 3080 graphics cards will have limited potential for cryptocurrency mining.
Nvidia already halved the hash rate of its GeForce RTX 3060 graphics card to limit its cryptocurrency mining potential. It'll do the same with its RTX 3080, RTX 3070 and RTX 3060 Ti, the company said Tuesday, labelling new cards "Lite Hash Rate" or "LHR" so you'll know which ones will be less efficient for mining.
"This reduced hash rate only applies to newly manufactured cards with the LHR identifier and not to cards already purchased," it said in a blog post.
The LHR cards will start shipping later this month.
GPUs -- used for PC gaming, video editing and other graphics-intensive activities -- have been hard to track down as the price of Bitcoin and Ethereum reaches new highs. These cryptocurrencies are mined using powerful computers, often equipped with multiple GPUs.