Press and coverage
More actions
Press articles, videos, Reddit threads and Telegram posts about the CMP 170HX unlock, from a Russian resale channel mocking the news in late June 2026 to Tom's Hardware's article on the consumer-card port in late October 2026, as members posted them on the Discord. Each entry gives the outlet, the date, the link and what members said about it, including how they thought each wave of coverage moved card prices. Dates are publication dates where a post gives one, otherwise the day the item was shared in the server. The dated prices are on Price history, July to October 2026 and Price history and market; who found what and when, including the card's 2021 history and first press, is on Unlock history: who found what, and when.
At a glance
| Date | Where | What |
|---|---|---|
| 2026-06-26 | M-Technics (Telegram) | Resale channel jokes that the unlock news is a provocation |
| 2026-07-16 | Reddit, r/LocalLLaMA | First public post of the memory unlock; commenters call it bogus |
| 2026-07-16 | Bilibili | Chinese video showing the compute unlock in an OpenCL test |
| about 2026-07-18 | YouTube | "170hx AI Server Build LIVESTREAM" |
| 2026-07-22 | Hackaday | "Industrial GPU Adapted For The Desktop" |
| 2026-07-24 | Chinese creator's stream | Credited with the demand explosion |
| early August | pbxscience.com | Write-up of the community's progress |
| 2026-08-07 | wccftech | Prices explode over 1000 USD as a tool unlocks 64/80 GB |
| about 2026-08-19 | Tom's Hardware | 64 GB of VRAM on a $250 CMP 170HX |
| 2026-08-21 and 08-23 | Reddit, r/LocalLLM | "6.3 → 193 TFLOPS" and "I Unlocked a $800 Mining GPU into a 64GB..." |
| 2026-08-30 | YouTube | A New Zealand miner with 70 cards asks whether to sell |
| 2026-09-05 | YouTube | "I'm No Longer SELLING My 170HX GPUs Anymore... Here's Why" |
| 2026-09-07 | YouTube | Chinese video on the tenfold price rise |
| 2026-09-09 | Linus Tech Tips | A 170HX video announced at the end of the BC-250 video |
| 2026-09-12 | Linus Tech Tips | The CMP 170HX video, id pvSdeU13hKc |
| 2026-09-16 | YouTube | Ranking video, 170HX at 9:46 |
| 2026-09-18 | Reddit, r/LocalLLaMA | 12 cards, "768gb vram for less than the price of one RTX 6000" |
| 2026-10-26 | Tom's Hardware | The compute unlock ported to RTX 20, 30 and 40 series cards |
| late October | YouTube | Several videos on the consumer-card port |
Telegram and Chinese channels
M-Technics, a Russian resale channel on Telegram, mocked the unlock news (late June 2026)
On 2026-06-26 @serplay228 said members of the M-Technics Telegram channel (a Taobao, 1688 and Pinduoduo resale channel) were joking that the CMP 170HX unlock news was a provocation by Russian special services; he said he and "blacksun" had been spreading the information there. On 2026-06-27 he shared a satirical M-Technics post showing an MI50 "before unlock, after unlock" with HBM3 and 3.2 TB/s, which @meatsus first took at face value. @petrikrohn_26497 linked an M-Technics post (t.me/mtechnicschina/5502) in which buyers were told "they haven't unblocked anything yet". @atsasin2126 also took part.
Reported
Source: @serplay228, 2026-06-26
Source: @meatsus, 2026-06-26
Source: @petrikrohn_26497, 2026-06-26
Source: @atsasin2126, 2026-06-26
A Chinese Bilibili video on the compute unlock (2026-07-16)
On 2026-07-16 @petrikrohn_26497 shared a Bilibili video (bilibili.com/video/BV1PGNq6tEhr; title roughly "Jensen's knife skills slipping? Compute and VRAM capacity both unsealed", translated from Chinese). Per Petri it shows screenshots of an OpenCL test with the compute unlock, and its authors claim it works. @meatsus judged it an overview only, with no memory unlock shown at that time. @icematty also took part.
Reported
Source: @petrikrohn_26497, 2026-07-16
Source: @meatsus, 2026-07-16
Source: @icematty, 2026-07-16
A Chinese creator's stream credited with the demand explosion (2026-07-24)
@sekkit_75019 posted a screenshot of a Chinese content creator (called "Red panda" in the thread), whom @deepseeker666 described as a famous blogger with many followers. @cute_sc2 said that creator is the reason demand for the cards exploded ("He is the reason it all exploded."), and @giaki3003 (partly joking) said sales lifted off after the stream. @dalzyyy had earlier named a large creator video as the "nightmare" scenario for prices. Whether this "Red panda" is the same as the Red Panda Mining YouTube channel is not clear from the thread.
Reported
Source: @sekkit_75019, 2026-07-24
Source: @deepseeker666, 2026-07-24
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-07-24
Source: @giaki3003, 2026-07-24
Source: @dalzyyy, 2026-07-24
The unlock went public on Reddit on 2026-07-16, and r/LocalLLaMA first thought it was bogus
@skirtchaser dates the public Reddit post of the 170HX memory unlock to 2026-07-16, and noted on 2026-07-20 that he had not heard of any order placed after that date actually shipping. @an_1248 said someone posted the unlock on r/LocalLLaMA a few days before 2026-07-19, where many commenters were skeptical, and @_arcanum_ said LocalLLaMA initially thought it was bogus. @meatsus bought a card the day before "someone released the unlock", after which prices tripled ("I literally purchased from her and next day someone released the unlock and prices went 3x"). A "170hx AI Server Build LIVESTREAM" YouTube video (youtube.com/watch?v=TLl6lqkHsY8) went up around 2026-07-18 (@jimtjames), and members worried the publicity would push prices up further. @skirtchaser said a local crypto mining group, still mining on free solar power and far from the AI scene, had already found the unlock, and @quark2world agreed that crypto miners knew more about it than the AI scene. @lorfidel noted that an HPC Telegram group was referring to a Chinese individual who had obtained an unlock, either from a leak or developed independently. @cute_sc2 also took part.
Reported
Source: @an_1248, 2026-07-19
Source: @meatsus, 2026-07-19
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-07-19
Source: @jimtjames, 2026-07-19
Source: @lorfidel, 2026-07-19
Source: @skirtchaser, 2026-07-20
Source: @_arcanum_, 2026-07-20
Source: @quark2world, 2026-07-20
Negative Reddit posts about failed unlocks: silicon lottery or price FUD? (August 2026)
In the order posted:
- @rrickk420 shared a screenshot of a post (apparently Reddit) about a card failing after unlock (2026-08-04). @ju5t5omedude wondered whether that card was stable at 8 GB to begin with, and Aeiou concluded it is still a lottery. Source: @rrickk420, 2026-08-04
Source: @ju5t5omedude, 2026-08-04
Source: @91d5a66bffc978331fac75b68fa86aba, 2026-08-04 - @jimtjames is convinced such Reddit posts aim to push prices down so the posters can buy more. Source: @jimtjames, 2026-08-04
- On 2026-08-05 @rrickk420 linked an r/LocalLLaMA post (reddit.com/r/LocalLLaMA/s/MNhzfUxXHi) and showed two different accounts posting identical content, apparently agent spam; @bayley_w suspected early content meant to drive prices down. Source: @bayley_w, 2026-08-04
Contested
Reddit skepticism, and a prediction that the repo would be mass-reported (August 2026)
@dalzyyy posted a Reddit exchange on 2026-08-06 in which people doubted the unlock; @rubbra_f said they were still unsure whether the unlock is stable, and @scallion_9883 said he had also been dragged on Reddit. @skirtchaser predicted that once 170HX results spread, upset people would mass-report the repo and the Discord linked from it. @zapirate called the doubt "cope": a GPU that was widely available for $200 now rivals $4,000 cards. He also listed real downsides (the current price, the poor condition of ex-mining cards) and noted that no big LLM YouTuber had posted results yet. The Discord history records no follow-up to the mass-report prediction.
Theory
Source: @dalzyyy, 2026-08-06
Source: @rubbra_f, 2026-08-06
Source: @scallion_9883, 2026-08-06
Source: @skirtchaser, 2026-08-06
Source: @zapirate, 2026-08-06
r/LocalLLM: the "6.3 → 193 TFLOPS" post, dismissed as a rehash (2026-08-21)
In the order posted:
- @rrickk420 shared a Reddit r/LocalLLM post titled "Unlocked a CMP 170HX: 6.3 → 193 TFLOPS tensor, pp512 599 → 3468" (reddit.com/r/LocalLLM/s/ujK5vHAKfo) on 2026-08-21. Source: @rrickk420, 2026-08-21
- @schakaqt asked whether it just measures the existing compute unlock against the locked state, and @dalzyyy dismissed it as an AI-written post presenting already-known information as new, using llama.cpp ("ai slop post and presenting info we already know as new. +llama.cpp lmao"). Source: @schakaqt, 2026-08-21
Source: @dalzyyy, 2026-08-21 - @irythros worried such posts would push card prices up. Source: @irythros, 2026-08-21
Contested
r/LocalLLM: "I Unlocked a $800 Mining GPU into a 64GB..." (2026-08-23)
@cute_sc2 shared the r/LocalLLM post "I Unlocked a $800 Mining GPU into a 64GB, 256K-Context Uncensored A..." (reddit.com/r/LocalLLM), asked who wrote it, and lamented "The prices will never go back down". @licensedterrapin said that with articles and Reddit posts out, everyone wants one, which keeps prices high even if 1,000 more cards are released.
Reported 8 GB
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-08-23
Source: @licensedterrapin, 2026-08-23
r/LocalLLaMA: 12 cards, 768 GB "for less than the price of one RTX 6000" (2026-09-18)
On 2026-09-18 @petrikrohn_26497 pointed out that a server member had posted his 12x CMP 170HX build on r/LocalLLaMA as "768gb vram for less than the price of one RTX 6000" (reddit.com/r/LocalLLaMA); 12 x 64 GB means unlocked 8 GB cards. @dalzyyy noted that many people were only now discovering the cards in the comments and that anyone hoping for a price drop was in for a rough time. @licensedterrapin and @ins_mniac also took part. Builds of this size: Large rigs (8 or more cards).
Reported 8 GB
Source: @petrikrohn_26497, 2026-09-18
Source: @dalzyyy, 2026-09-18
Source: @licensedterrapin, 2026-09-18
Source: @ins_mniac, 2026-09-18
Articles
Hackaday: "Industrial GPU Adapted For The Desktop" (2026-07-22)
Hackaday published "Industrial GPU Adapted For The Desktop" on 2026-07-22 (hackaday.com), shared in the server on 2026-07-23. The same day @_arcanum_ referred to a video made "right before the patch went public", placing the public release shortly before; on 2026-07-24 @diabeetee said "the last few days" had proved the card's value, and asking prices moved toward $1,300 to $1,500. @_studebaker_ warned that content creators draw attention "up the chain of command" and asked people to keep things low-key. @roger_dammit also took part.
Reported
Source: @roger_dammit, 2026-07-23
Source: @_studebaker_, 2026-07-23
Source: @_arcanum_, 2026-07-23
Source: @diabeetee, 2026-07-23
pbxscience.com on how far the community had got (early August 2026)
@rrickk420 shared a pbxscience.com article, "Unlocking the CMP 170HX: How Far the Community Has Actually Gotten Toward an A100 on the Cheap" (pbxscience.com), an external write-up of the community's unlock progress as of early August 2026.
Reported
Source: @rrickk420, 2026-08-05
wccftech on the price spike, an earlier member video, and the Level1Techs idea (August 2026)
wccftech covered the unlock and the price spike on 2026-08-07 (wccftech.com); @cute_sc2: "Whelp, now everyone knows. Goodbye low prices." An earlier YouTube video by a server member, "I Can't Believe the 170HX Can Do THIS Now!", had already spread the news (links posted: youtube.com/watch?v=4IotZmCQp-g and youtube.com/watch?v=2jXNs3Hrgpg). @endsjeremy suggested Wendell of Level1Techs might help, since Amogh needed an A100 ES; Wendell had just covered the 24G to 48G 4090 VRAM upgrade, and @petrikrohn_26497 noted he mentions the BC250 unlock. @ju5t5omedude doubted Level1Techs would risk running unauthorized NVIDIA code on camera. @phoenixone7 also took part.
Reported
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-08-06
Source: @phoenixone7, 2026-08-06
Source: @endsjeremy, 2026-08-06
Source: @petrikrohn_26497, 2026-08-06
Source: @ju5t5omedude, 2026-08-06
Tom's Hardware on the 64 GB unlock (around 2026-08-19)
On 2026-08-19 @artistosu shared Tom's Hardware's article on the software unlock giving 64 GB of VRAM on a $250 CMP 170HX (tomshardware.com). @dalzyyy said this was about a month late: he had posted about it on r/LocalLLaMA about a month earlier, when cards already cost about $500 ("They were already 500usd by then"), though he said he was himself a month late to the unlock; @voidgiraffe and others mocked the comment threads on Reddit, WCCFtech and VideoCardz. @bayley_w attributed the price surge of 2026-08-20/21 to that article, and @schakaqt described the usual pattern: a discovery or software support for old hardware gets picked up by tech media and prices explode. @djpandaman thought prices were still below true market value given how little mainstream coverage there had been, and on 2026-08-24 noted there was still little media coverage. On 2026-08-25 @stcord blamed rising prices on "the lemmings watching the YouTube vids and reading the tomshardware gospel"; @sojun80 said YouTube had largely ignored the cards so far, and @quark2world said coverage had peaked and further benchmarks would not move prices. @matej87 also took part in that thread.
Tom's Hardware's second article (2026-10-26), on the port of the compute unlock to consumer cards, is in the October section below.
Reported 8 GB
Source: @artistosu, 2026-08-19
Source: @dalzyyy, 2026-08-19
Source: @voidgiraffe, 2026-08-19
Source: @bayley_w, 2026-08-21
Source: @schakaqt, 2026-08-21
Source: @djpandaman, 2026-08-21
Source: @djpandaman, 2026-08-24
Source: @stcord, 2026-08-24
Source: @sojun80, 2026-08-24
Source: @quark2world, 2026-08-24
Source: @matej87, 2026-08-24
YouTube and Linus Tech Tips
Red Panda Mining: the main 170HX YouTube channel, renting cards out (July and August 2026)
As of 2026-07-28 Red Panda Mining (RPM) was the only YouTube channel that came up for "170hx". RPM rented 170HX capacity through SimplePod and vast.ai; @giaki3003 said renting from RPM was cheaper than his own electricity and that RPM sits on about 600 cards. @endsjeremy said RPM's low rental pricing across six servers undercut the whole market, and around 2026-07-29 RPM moved to about $0.20/hr, the break-even figure he had just posted; @giaki3003 disagreed that RPM was wrecking the market, since RPM could not get its own cards rented. Per @rrickk420 and @jecquas (2026-08-29), RPM's latest video said he had signed a contract worth five figures a month renting his cards to an inference provider and was not selling more. @thad1337 said "he" has about 180 cards bought for around $200 the year before and chose $500 Gigabyte servers over modding Octominer cases; the thread does not make clear whether this is RPM, and 180 does not match the figure of about 600. @_studebaker_ assumed the renter uses GPUs individually rather than pipeline-parallel (@cute_sc2 guessed Qwen 3.8 27B) and that such a contract needs spare machines to meet uptime terms. @deejay9983, @rubbra_f and @redpandamining also took part.
Reported
Source: @deejay9983, 2026-07-28
Source: @giaki3003, 2026-07-28
Source: @endsjeremy, 2026-07-28
Source: @rubbra_f, 2026-07-28
Source: @rrickk420, 2026-08-29
Source: @jecquas, 2026-08-29
Source: @thad1337, 2026-08-29
Source: @redpandamining, 2026-08-29
Source: @_studebaker_, 2026-08-29
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-08-29
Is Red Panda Mining driving prices? (August 2026)
@giaki3003 had argued on 2026-07-29 that RPM was not wrecking the market (previous entry). In the August thread, in the order posted:
- @.philow called "red panda" the main price driver, along with miners and scalpers (2026-08-16). Source: @.philow, 2026-08-16
- @segmond said redpanda was far more competent than others: he built a rig, unlocked cards, tested AI workloads, rented them out almost free for feedback, and "At least he was honest when he came across a non working card". Source: @segmond, 2026-08-16
- @ju5t5omedude suspected YouTube and affiliate incentives too, and @sealclubber joked about the fan screech in redpanda's videos. @quark2world also took part. Source: @ju5t5omedude, 2026-08-16
Source: @sealclubber, 2026-08-16
Source: @quark2world, 2026-08-16
Contested
YouTube: a New Zealand miner with 70 cards asks whether to sell (2026-08-30)
@ju5t5omedude linked the video (youtu.be/AeyoVo3kdo0) of the miner people had called Australian, who is a New Zealander, owns 70 CMP 170HX cards and asked whether he should sell them.
Reported
Source: @ju5t5omedude, 2026-08-30
YouTube: "I'm No Longer SELLING My 170HX GPUs Anymore... Here's Why" (2026-09-05)
@stcord shared this video with a timestamp (youtu.be/VoNBnwGPamE at 9:19), in which the creator says AI companies buy or rent these cards ("Supposedly AI companies buy/rent them"). It marks the cards' rising mainstream visibility in early September 2026. The post does not name the channel.
Reported
Source: @stcord, 2026-09-05
A Chinese YouTube video on the tenfold price rise (2026-09-07)
@phoenixone7 shared a Chinese YouTube video (youtube.com/watch?v=J58FXpo3L4U) on the 170HX price having risen more than tenfold, showing the topic had spread further.
Reported
Source: @phoenixone7, 2026-09-07
Linus Tech Tips announces a video, and members expect a demand flood (2026-09-09)
On 2026-09-09 @spectakkular said prices would not come down because "Linus Tech Tips already announced a video is coming". @djpandaman found the announcement at the end of LTT's BC-250 video (youtu.be/lmLh29LE2W4 at 11:00), @cute_sc2 said a 170HX video was "supposedly" coming, and @skirtchaser wondered whether DMCA anti-circumvention law would stop it. @djpandaman noted that until then coverage had been only RPM and small Eastern European channels (top recent video about 25k views), and expected a mainstream video to bring a flood of demand and scalping; @cibernox bought a second pair because of it, and @ezybr0 also took part. The video came out on 2026-09-12 (below).
Theory
Source: @spectakkular, 2026-09-09
Source: @djpandaman, 2026-09-09
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-09-09
Source: @skirtchaser, 2026-09-09
Source: @ezybr0, 2026-09-09
Source: @cibernox, 2026-09-09
A fake "LTT video soon" account (2026-09-09)
@rrickk420 claimed Linus (LTT) was in the Discord and that people should stock up. @adusts pointed out that the account was created the day it joined and was named ltt170hxvideosoon_18811, so it was a joke account, not LTT ("No way people are just betting this on an account made the day it joined being called ltt170hxvideosoon_18811").
Reported
Source: @rrickk420, 2026-09-09
Source: @adusts, 2026-09-09
Linus Tech Tips publishes its CMP 170HX video (2026-09-12)
Linus Tech Tips published its CMP 170HX video on 2026-09-12 around 17:05 UTC (youtube.com/watch?v=pvSdeU13hKc, video id pvSdeU13hKc). Members quoted two titles for the same video id: "Free RAM, not a SCAM" (@dalzyyy's thread) and "This GPU can be Hacked to Unlock Secret Memory" (@louis7132, @petrikrohn_26497), about the CMP 170HX unlocked to 64 GB. The video used llama.cpp (see llama.cpp on CMP cards), did the cap mod ("Ok looks like they did the cap mod"), showed a card with memory errors, covered the PCIe limits and mentioned the Discord; @ins_mniac called it fair and not overhyped, and @jjb01957 found it far more positive than expected, essentially encouraging people to buy. @phoenixone7 spotted an LTT staffer in the server (around 12:32 in the video, youtu.be/pvSdeU13hKc?t=752) and worried NVIDIA might now block driver updates; @dalzyyy relayed that, according to bayley, NVIDIA's engineers do not care, and asked the LTT staffer for the LTT Labs CT-scan 3D models to help waterblock work. @djpandaman said LTT did not buy the cards used in the video, expected 100 to 200 new members that night, and asked Amogh to move the Discord link back to the top of the GitHub README, since new members join through the invite on the repo. @sh.ad ("bye bye current prices") and @c133 expected prices to jump; on 2026-09-13 @a.civardagezen asked how prices were doing and @darcidride said it was too soon to tell, with eBay prices still high in his region. On 2026-09-17 @petrikrohn_26497 wrote "The CMP 170HX 64GB has gone mainstream!", @xtj7 lamented it, and @matstatman noted that YouTube and Instagram keep hyping the card, sustaining prices. @neapopa, @prefix10k and @josephur also took part.
Reported 8 GB
Source: @dalzyyy, 2026-09-12
Source: @phoenixone7, 2026-09-12
Source: @ins_mniac, 2026-09-12
Source: @neapopa, 2026-09-12
Source: @prefix10k, 2026-09-12
Source: @sh.ad, 2026-09-12
Source: @c133, 2026-09-12
Source: @djpandaman, 2026-09-12
Source: @josephur, 2026-09-12
Source: @louis7132, 2026-09-12
Source: @c133, 2026-09-12
Source: @jjb01957, 2026-09-12
Source: @djpandaman, 2026-09-12
Source: @a.civardagezen, 2026-09-13
Source: @darcidride, 2026-09-13
Source: @petrikrohn_26497, 2026-09-17
Source: @xtj7, 2026-09-17
Source: @matstatman, 2026-09-17
YouTube ranking video covers the 170HX at 9:46 (2026-09-16)
@stcord shared "The Only Local AI GPUs Worth Buying Right Now (Ranked)" (youtube.com/watch?v=Oa3MUGsFays), which discusses the CMP 170HX at 9:46. @con3po7016 joked about prices going to $15k a card. This kind of coverage coincided with the September price rise.
Reported
Source: @stcord, 2026-09-16
Source: @con3po7016, 2026-09-16
October 2026: the consumer-card port
Tom's Hardware covers the consumer-card port of the cmpunlocker compute unlock (2026-10-26)
On 2026-10-26 Tom's Hardware published an article (tomshardware.com) on the firmware exploit that removes the half-speed tensor throttle on RTX 20, 30 and 40 series cards: doubled peak tensor rate on the RTX 4090 and up to 80 percent more matrix math on the RTX 3090 Ti. @stcord noted the article properly credited the project; @zagitta, who wrote the consumer port, had not seen it yet. @djpandaman's summary for a returning member: "the compute unlocks from cmpunlocker were ported over to consumer cards", which brought much more visibility to the unlock projects. The consumer tool is Zagitta/gpu-unlock (github.com/Zagitta/gpu-unlock), public on 2026-10-23/24, described as "version agnostic" and able to coexist with cmpunlocker.
Tom's Hardware had already covered the 170HX itself around 2026-08-19 (the 64 GB article above), which @bayley_w blamed for the price surge of 2026-08-20/21. @zagitta's consumer-card work was under way by 2026-09-24, when he said Opus 5.5 stopped analysing register dumps while he was trying to unlock FMLA32 speed on a 3090; on 2026-09-06 he had joked about asking NVIDIA's lockdown engineer for the signing key, and answered that NVIDIA cared about miners because they were paying customers, unlike e-waste owners.
Reported
Source: @artistosu, 2026-08-19
Source: @bayley_w, 2026-08-21
Source: @zagitta, 2026-09-06
Source: @zagitta, 2026-09-24
Source: @stcord, 2026-10-26
Source: @djpandaman, 2026-10-26
Source: @zagitta, 2026-10-26
Zagitta's vLLM prefill mod goes viral (2026-10-24)
@stcord posted on 2026-10-24 a screenshot of a Google employee retweeting @zagitta's mod. Zagitta said he had it working for over a month but saw only 2 to 3 percent on his own Claude-optimized ninfer-3090 fork, and did not publish until a conversation revealed "turns out it's quite big for vllm prefill". The posts do not describe the mod itself; the dates line up with the consumer tensor unlock going public on 2026-10-23/24, but no post says they are the same thing. On 2026-09-24 Zagitta had said Opus 5.5 stopped analysing register dumps while he was trying to unlock FMLA32 speed on a 3090, which fits "working for over a month" by 2026-10-24.
Reported
Source: @zagitta, 2026-09-24
Source: @stcord, 2026-10-24
Source: @zagitta, 2026-10-24
Videos on the consumer-card port, a meme coin, and the wish for less attention (October 2026)
After the consumer port, @mountains1605 said he preferred when nobody was paying attention; @endsjeremy describes this Discord as two layers from where the work happens ("something > clean room > cmpunlocker"). Videos posted in the server, titles as posted: "Your GPU Is Nerfed for Local AI (NVIDIA's Hidden Limit)" (which @petrikrohn_26497 corrected), "Nvidia GPU UNLOCK for Local AI - 3090's Prefill 62% FASTER!", a Zen 6 benchmark video from the biggest channel covering it so far (mention at 0:08), and "Your Graphics Card Has Been Running AI at Half Speed". The links posted were youtube.com/watch?v=opyJVz_T1GY, youtube.com/watch?v=i_HCjXiGy04 (the Zen 6 video) and youtube.com/watch?v=WCDjkrKlMIY; only the Zen 6 link can be matched to its title from the posts. "There's a bunch of videos by now hah" (@globalapathy). Someone created a meme coin around the unlock; @zagitta refused to share it.
The wish for less attention is as old as the server. @lorfidel (2026-06-27) did not want skeptics proved wrong; @_studebaker_ (2026-07-23) warned that content creators draw attention "up the chain of command" and asked people to keep things low-key; @dalzyyy called a large creator video the "nightmare" scenario for prices (2026-07-24); @cute_sc2 on the wccftech article: "Whelp, now everyone knows. Goodbye low prices." (2026-08-06).
Reported 8 GB and 10 GB
Source: @lorfidel, 2026-06-27
Source: @_studebaker_, 2026-07-23
Source: @dalzyyy, 2026-07-24
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-08-06
Source: @mountains1605, 2026-10-26
Source: @endsjeremy, 2026-10-26
Source: @globalapathy, 2026-10-27
Source: @zagitta, 2026-10-27
Source: @petrikrohn_26497, 2026-10-27
How coverage moved prices
What members said about coverage and prices, in date order. The prices themselves, dated, are on Price history, July to October 2026.
Supplier prices exploded on Sunday 2026-07-19, days after the Reddit post
@quark2world placed his order on Friday 2026-07-17, "at the start of the craziness" but before the public unlock. @vcore2191 saw the unlock posted on r/LocalLLaMA a couple of days before 2026-07-20, where commenters called it fake, and only found the repo and this Discord on 2026-07-20. @cute_sc2 says supplier prices exploded early on Sunday morning (GMT+2), that is 2026-07-19, right after paying for 16 cards at $480 each ("I ordered for 480 per piece before prices exploded on Sunday morning (gmt+2) at huateng."). @sojun80 reports that everyone who ordered over that weekend got the run-around from suppliers.
Reported
Source: @quark2world, 2026-07-20
Source: @vcore2191, 2026-07-20
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-07-20
Source: @sojun80, 2026-07-20
Red Panda Mining started the hype; Taobao sold out by 2026-07-17
@cute_sc2 said on 2026-07-22 that the unlock "was clear before that too, but not widely known" and that Red Panda Mining made it popular and started the hype; @quark2world linked a Red Panda Mining post on X (x.com/RedPandaMining). @_arcanum_ noted that cards had vanished from Taobao by Friday 2026-07-17, so Chinese sellers already knew, while the supplier-side @aifonder_66800 said they had heard the rumours but did not believe them. @quark2world first heard of the card on AI Discord servers; he credited Amogh with finding the unlock (joking about waiting for Amogh to unlock the A100 40GB too), which differs from Amogh's own statement that he is not the original author (see Unlock history: who found what, and when). @quark2world called it "the 56gb hbm that was lost for 3years": the 8 GB card physically carries 64 GB.
Reported 8 GB
Source: @cute_sc2, 2026-07-22
Source: @_arcanum_, 2026-07-22
Source: @aifonder_66800, 2026-07-22
Source: @quark2world, 2026-07-22
Backlash: the unlock mostly enriches resellers and miners (late July 2026)
@machinezer0 argued on 2026-07-24 that the community's advances were mostly enriching resellers and miners, and proposed: "The community should pivot to CMP100-210 efforts or hold back all new advancements until prices settle." @quark2world joked about a "Quarkcampaign" discouraging overpaying when AiLFond cut prices.
Reported
Source: @machinezer0, 2026-07-24
Source: @quark2world, 2026-07-24
Will prices fall? Collusion and FOMO against finite supply (August 2026)
In the order posted:
- @danske1 argued on 2026-08-23 that the price hikes are artificial, from collusion among the few holders, and @deejay9983 said supply still exceeds demand. Source: @danske1, 2026-08-23
Source: @deejay9983, 2026-08-23 - @matej87 said the prices have no merit for worn mining cards with no warranty, cooling problems and hardware mods; with miners holding hundreds of racks, he expected prices to fall within weeks if buyers stop panic-buying ("If we cool off, the prices will fall off in weeks."), and advised waiting 1 to 2 months. Source: @matej87, 2026-08-23
- @licensedterrapin and @voidgiraffe countered that supply is finite, eBay demand is real, coverage on Reddit and in articles keeps growing, and new-GPU prices are rising too; NVIDIA was also reported to be cutting consumer GPU supply (post on X). Source: @licensedterrapin, 2026-08-23
Source: @voidgiraffe, 2026-08-23 - @segmond and @artistosu attributed the spike to mainstream articles and to buying waves on Korean forums; @chris.via.egnatia also took part. Source: @segmond, 2026-08-23
Source: @artistosu, 2026-08-23
Source: @chris.via.egnatia, 2026-08-23
What prices did next is on Price history and market.
Contested
Prices around the release: about $200 to $300 before, $700 to $900 on repo day
Members recalled prices from before and at the public release (2026-08-27). @zanooda said cards were about $250 when the first Twitter post claimed they could be unlocked; he thought it was a scam and expected no unlocker to be published. @dufrelic bought 2 at 225 EUR each and did not dare buy more after the unlock paper was published. @quark2world bought at $450 one day before Amogh dropped his repo ("i bought for $450 1 day before amogh dropped his repo"), and said the price had already doubled on exploit rumours, although only a small group had the code and could review it. On day 1 (the repo release) cards sold for $700 to $900; @artistosu bought 4 at $900. @cressida1881 and @p4y4 also took part. The thread does not give the release date itself; the competing dates are on Unlock history: who found what, and when.
Proven 8 GB
Source: @zanooda, 2026-08-27
Source: @dufrelic, 2026-08-27
Source: @quark2world, 2026-08-27
Source: @artistosu, 2026-08-27
Source: @cressida1881, 2026-08-27
Source: @p4y4, 2026-08-27
Early skepticism, and buyers who spread FUD to keep prices down (August 2026)
@ezybr0 said on 2026-08-30 that at first he thought the unlock claim was AI psychosis or a seller pumping useless GPUs, and only took it seriously after someone posted results ("It was only after I saw someone post results is when I took it seriously"). @reala7096 said many people claimed the unlock was unreliable, which kept him away, and that buying from Alibaba looked risky. @ezybr0 admitted he then joined in spreading FUD while he bought cards, to secure them at a decent price.
Reported
Source: @ezybr0, 2026-08-30
Source: @reala7096, 2026-08-30
Satire, fakes and trolling
Satire and trolling in chat are not findings (August 2026)
Several posts are deliberate trolling and must not be read as results: a "170hx dear edition has HBM4", "unlocked 128GB on my 170hx" via Claude, "248 sm's and pcie6.0", "Nice/sec" benchmarks, and a "wireless unlocked 128gb 90hx" dud-unlocker joke (2026-08-17). Members joked about spreading fake screenshots to mislead sellers, and @sealclubber suggested spreading discouraging information instead; a seller did pick up one of these fake screenshots (see Rumours and claims to verify). On 2026-08-22 members joked about spreading FUD to cool demand with lines such as "33% faulty memory", "missing VRM stages" and "PCIe gen1", which are satire, not findings. @_arcanum_ predicted bad LocalLLaMA benchmarks from people using the worst backends, and noted seriously that many mining cards lack provenance; @irythros: "you dont have to lie about the card to make it seem bad. You just dont need to say the good part". @giaki3003, @_studebaker_, @kellertreppe123, @matstatman, @quark2world, @lrdimm and @artistosu took part in these threads. The fake "LTT video soon" account is in the YouTube section above.
Reported
Source: @giaki3003, 2026-08-17
Source: @_studebaker_, 2026-08-17
Source: @kellertreppe123, 2026-08-17
Source: @irythros, 2026-08-17
Source: @matstatman, 2026-08-17
Source: @sealclubber, 2026-08-17
Source: @_arcanum_, 2026-08-22
Source: @irythros, 2026-08-22
Source: @quark2world, 2026-08-22
Source: @lrdimm, 2026-08-22
Source: @artistosu, 2026-08-22