Yeah mining is not the huge problem it was.
I've been watching stock on OCUK and they have had the 6800XT and 6900XT in stock for months. Even the 6500XT seems plentiful. I've not used them as "tell all" though because Nvidia cards have been gone. However, a quick look today and...
Literally a full page of 3060s in stock. The issue? the prices. IMO GPUs are finally starting to come into supply and sitting in stock. This means that either the demand has dropped to the point where stock remains *or* people have decided they are not going to pay those prices no matter what.
I'm the latter. For me to upgrade it would have to be either a 3080Ti or 6900XT but I am simply not prepared to pay those prices.
Nvidia claimed that last year was their most successful year ever. Like, whilst we were being told that Ampere cards were simply not able to be made in large volume? apparently that was wrong and they have sold more Ampere cards than any other generation. So there were no huge supply issues. The problem was demand. And a combination of other factors.
Covering the demand? well yeah, mining obs. Thing is? that wasn't the only issue. The other issue was many people were told by reviewers that RT was bunk (and I agree totally) and thus the 20 series being so over priced (because they were using TSMC and Turing was really expensive) avoided the 20 series completely. Which makes sense, as I did that for ages before finally getting so bored with my Titan XP that I bought a 2070 Super. For literally no reason at all.
Problem is people had been waiting since the 900 series to upgrade and Ampere sounded perfect. Which is what led to the huge delirium over it and why so many over paid for gaming cards, not mining cards.
Nvidia did this the last time mining was a thing. Whipped up hype and created huge demand for products you just couldn't get. They did this to make money sure, but also to cover themselves for the fallout. IE, when the bomb has exploded and the hype dies down you are left with the fallout where you will make FAR less money than you were. Hence getting the money in so you can survive the fallout.
Which IMO? hasn't fully started to settle yet. When it does though? yeah, you will see the shelves filled with crap and eventually as it starts to stagnate the prices will fall.
So IMO AMD could have made as much money as they wanted at the end of 2021 Q4. They are going to need that for the coming fallout. And it is coming, because like I said OCUK have had stock of their over priced cards for months now. Not days or weeks, but months.