Nvidia · China · Blackwell · Tom's Hardware
Leaked video exposes how industrial-scale Chinese factories are dismantling RTX 5090s by the thousands to fuel AI servers
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If you are wondering why the GeForce RTX 5090, despite being one of the best graphics cards, has evaporated from retail shelves, the answer lies in China’s industrial conversion factories.
Key facts
- Custom GeForce RTX 5090 graphics cards now start at an eye-watering $8,500
- Sometimes these GeForce RTX 5090 prebuilts cost less than a standalone GeForce RTX 5090, while offering a fully assembled system with a manufacturer's warranty
- Nvidia has reportedly halted production of the GeForce RTX 5090 and is, in all likelihood, redirecting the valuable silicon to higher-margin professional GPUs like the RTX Pro 6000 Blackwell
- After testing and validation, workers would repackage these modified GeForce RTX 5090 graphics cards and ship them to clients, likely data centers or AI labs
Summary
The GeForce RTX 30-series upgrade matrix, does your Ampere GPU need an upgrade in 2026? So, what exactly is a GeForce RTX 5090 doing in China when the graphics card is not even officially available there? The recently leaked footage offers a glimpse inside these Chinese workshops, where skilled technicians meticulously desolder the pricey flagship’s GB202 silicon and GDDR7 memory chips. The GeForce RTX 5090 blower graphics cards will ultimately end up in high-density server racks where they will become the backbone of massive AI compute clusters. Many of these Chinese factories are scattered throughout the country.