It's hard to believe we're in 2021 and yet another Amazon Prime Day is upon us, but that's the reality right now. It seems only yesterday that we were highlighting the best PC hardware deals here for Prime Day and other annual promotions.
We're doing the same for this year's event, though it's going to be meticulously put together and updated to ensure we're going to be recommending only actual deals. There's no way I'd purchase a motherboard that has a discount applied to an inflated price and so I wouldn't expect anyone else to do the same. This is why I'm going to be really picky with any deals I take advantage of.
A world of problems
It's nigh impossible to purchase a GPU, be it NVIDIA's latest 30 series or AMD's Radeon offerings. You'll not only struggle to buy them at MSRP but also at inflated prices too. Scalpers are making a fortune across the entire catalog of PC hardware and continue to do so through 2021 as demand remains higher than supply.
This problem is expected to continue through 2021 and beyond, according to suppliers. The combination of the COVID pandemic, global semiconductor shortage, more people working from home, the popularity (and accessibility) of cryptocurrency mining, and more people wanting to upgrade their systems has led to a worldwide shortage of tech.
An NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is a brilliant GPU and one that's well worth the $459 asking price set by the company. If you look at online stores and classified sites like eBay, you'll find prices starting from $1,000. That's more than double the original MSRP, which is incredible.
People are always quick to make a buck wherever they can and, unfortunately, it's currently affecting the PC hardware market. Deals through Prime Day aren't likely to cover GPUs and if they do, we're expecting the stock to be allocated within moments of a promotion going live. It's going to be difficult to find deals on other PC components.
Searching for Prime Day deals
There's always a risk with any deal a retailer publishes that it may not actually be a discount, at least not on the original price. Tools like CamelCamelCamel can help separate enticing deals from offers that aren't worth bothering with. You can often find prices inflated just before a promotion like Prime Day to then be discounted back to the same listed price with a "25% off!" tag applied.
It's not just PC hardware either, but everything that makes use of semiconductors and other vital components. We're big fans of network-attached storage (NAS) here, but again it's going to be tough to locate actual deals. To help make your Prime Day a little easier to get through, we're going to be rounding up only the best PC part deals and best NAS deals.
