RTX 5090 price hikes will sting anyone who absolutely needs to jam the GPU into their rig right now, and beating the increases is tough. In fact, it's so tough that even if you manage to snag the graphics card before on-page MSRPs change, you might still end up having to pay over $5,000, especially since Asus is apparently "late" in providing Nvidia with revised figures.
Look, no one should expect to pay dramatically less for an RTX 5090 right now, as it's the best graphics card in terms of performance and is sought after by gaming PC players and the AI scene alike. But one player did technically manage to grab the GPU for $4,982 rather than $5,100, beating fresh Asus price hikes through Nvidia's listing, and while that should have saved the buyer around $553, the order was then cancelled.
The GPU scene continues to be a mess right now, and the RTX 5090 has sat above its $2,000 MSRP since day one. If you four digit pricing isn't remotely in your budget, you'll want to check out a 4K-capable GPU like the Radeon RX 9070 for $649.99 or the RTX 5070 for $715, but both are still overpriced.
Reddit user Independantok1031 says they reached out to Nvidia after their ROG Astral RTX 5090 BTF order was cancelled, which seemingly kickstarted a wave of finger-pointing (via Videocardz). Nvidia apparently says the blame lies with Asus, whereas the board partner claims it has "nothing to do with it." Eventually, the buyer managed to get a more in-depth explanation from Nvidia, but no one is still willing to fulfill the order.
Update from yesterday canceled orderfrom r/ASUSROG
"After checking with ASUS for clarification, we were informed that the price change update was provided a little late," admits Nvidia. "As a result, when you placed the order at the order price, ASUS cancelled the order because they were unable to fulfil it at the previous price rate."
"We understand your frustration, especially since the order was placed before the updated price appeared on our website. We did request ASUS to honor your original order; however, they are unable to fulfil the request at the previous price at this time."
Simply put, neither Nvidia nor Asus is willing to work together to correct their mistake. The fact that Nvidia, a company valued at over 5 trillion, didn't offer to make up the $553 difference is ludicrous, especially since the pricing error was through its site specifically, and Asus seems to be refusing to set a pricing precedent.
The whole situation actually highlights one of the horrifying realities of buying anything online. If you walked into a physical store in the US or the UK and picked up this same RTX 5090 at its old MSRP, no one would legally be able to stop you from leaving. However, in both regions, retailers can cancel and refund your money if you've paid less than they intended, because the transition is technically complete only once an order has shipped.
Ultimately, it's the customer who is losing out while Nvidia and Asus seemingly refuse to work on their communication issues. Either company can pass the blame between themselves perpetually, but ultimately, the instance demonstrates that there are big issues with the third-party storefront partnership, and the RTX 5090 pricing should have been honored since it's an internal mistake.
Should Nvidia have covered the cost of the RTX 5090 despite claiming Asus provided it with pricing updates late? I suspect there's a wider logistical problem behind the scenes here, as I really can't see why neither party would simply come up with a solution in the name of good customer service, especially if it was just the one instance. Instead, the unsuspecting PC player was subjected to a professionally catty back-and-forth blame game that resolved nothing, and that isn't a remotely good look.
Swing by the best CPU for gaming and best RAM if you're trying to build an entire rig.
