Let's hope these sub-MSRP GPUs in Germany are a sign of things to come

What a strange day it is to see a graphics card selling for less than MSRP. As of yesterday, the AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT could be found at German retailer Mindfactory's online store for €169—that's around 35% less than the recommended retail price.

What's off about the whole thing, is that that Tom's Hardware noted the discounted price only showed up after some cookie-based shenanigans revealed it, which leads us to minor a warning about purchasing GPUs online. We'll get to that in a moment.

In the US and UK, the recommended retail price for an RX 6500 XT is around $199/£179. Sadly it doesn't appear the US is on the same wavelength as the forward-thinking Europeans in terms of GPU prices, as a quick check of Newegg and B&H Photo revealed.

As for the UK, you can find a single-fan PowerColor RX 6500 XT for £180 at Overclockers, and hotukdeals has a dual-fan MSI RX 6500 XT going for £190. That's a little better, but for a card we scored a 47 in the review you'd think companies would be happy to give a little discount.

What the prices in Germany and the UK might point toward, however, is the start if a downward trend in GPU prices. We've already had news that apparently Nvidia told its partners it will be lowering manufacturing costs, though the respective savings appear to only apply to system integrators (SIs) or PC builders, less so to the public. 

Still, we've got 2022 pegged as the year GPU prices come back down to relative normality. In January, we already saw GPUs getting cheaper in 2022, and there's talk that GPU pricing could drop down to 'normal' by the summer.

It could be that we'll even start to see a downward shift in the price of the best graphics cards, rather than the already supposed budget cards of this current generation.

Either way, Tom's Hardware encourages you to check around a site before confirming your purchase on a new GPU.

"We visited this special offers section from the RX 6500 XT search results page, which had the same cards listed at a higher price. However, on returning to the search results page (with seven different models available) we noticed the prices had dipped to match the special offers."

So as tempting as it is to gobble up a GPU the second you find one for sale, be cautious, keep your wits about you. There could be deals lurking in the back pages somewhere.