NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 with 20GB memory: under $600 on sale in China

It seems that leading into NVIDIA's next-gen Ada Lovelace GPU architecture being unleashed, we're hearing all sorts of rumors on the new RTX 40 series GPUs... but now we're seeing the GeForce RTX 3080 with 20GB of GDDR6X hitting shelves in China.

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MSI's custom GeForce RTX 3080 VENTUS 3X OC (never released)

MSI's custom GeForce RTX 3080 20GB VENTUS 3X OC graphics card is now making the rounds on social media, which is different from the one that hit Russian markets a year ago now in August 2021 in the form of the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti with 20GB of GDDR6X memory. To be clear: the RTX 3080 ships with 10GB of GDDR6X memory and the RTX 3080 Ti ships with 12GB of GDDR6X memory... so these new VRAM configurations are cool to see.

GPU mining is winding down for Ethereum, so crypto market farms are now switching to mining alternative cryptocurrencies or selling their hardware. Some of them are selling up, and this is how we're discovering that alternate and unreleased graphics cards were being used to mine cryptocurrency. The unreleased GeForce RTX 3080 with 20GB of GDDR6X memory is one of them.

• Read more: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti with 20GB is real, 100MH/s mining power
• Read more: AORUS GeForce RTX 3080 Ti with 20GB GDDR6X memory discovered in Russia

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You can see here it's the "VENTUS 3X 20G OC" from MSI

You can see here in the photo that we have the "GA102-250-KD" GPU with MSI's custom "VENTUS 3X 20G OC" right there on the back of the card. This could be an elaborate fake, but it would be quite the effort to go to for well... I don't know what you'd gain. But NVIDIA selling custom models of its GeForce RTX 3080 to miners en masse, and we're only finding out about it on the months-away eve of next-gen Ada Lovelace GPUs... gee.

This means that NVIDIA has been making:

• GeForce RTX 3080 with 10GB GDDR6X
• GeForce RTX 3080 with 12GB GDDR6X
• GeForce RTX 3080 with 20GB GDDR6X

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Yep, display connectivity... not just a mining GPU

It's not just a crypto mining GPU either... it has full display connectivity with 1 x HDMI 2.1 port and 3 x DisplayPort 1.4 connectors like usual. This means it would slot right into a PC and have displays connected to it, versus a mining-only GPU without display connectors.

• Read more: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 with custom BIOS: 20GB + 12GB GDDR6X tested
• Read more: GeForce RTX 3080, or RTX 3080 Ti engineering sample with 20GB tested
• Read more: GIGABYTE also confirms GeForce RTX 3080 Ti with 20GB cards are coming

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The RTX 3080 with 20GB GDDR6X with 97.48MH/s with ETHASH

"honxxing2020" has the card in hand, saying that you can find MSI's custom GeForce RTX 3080 20GB VENTUS 3X OC graphics card for around 3XXX RMB (which works out to between $432 and $600 or so). VideoCardz also notes that they come with a warranty sticker and are brand new... so you might be lucky with these cards. As VC also points out, it would be an interesting collector's item... that's for sure.