Cryptocurrency Miners Go Back to GPUs… for AI
June 13th, 2026AI companies buy up nearly all the GPUs, RAM and SSDs: Check
Crypto miners turn to renting rigs for AI, buying up what remains of “consumer” grade equipment: Check
People who mostly hate AI, and try to avoid it, pay a lot more for a lot less when trying to purchase a computer: Check
Six months ago, a client asked me if a Lenovo laptop was a good deal (AMD/32GB/1TB/5060/OLED). I told her that it was a remarkably good deal and that the same system would cost probably NZ$1000 more within a few months. She bought two of them.
She called me last week saying she needed another one of those laptops. The same exact machine was on sale again… for NZ$960 more than what she previously paid.
I didn’t post this video earlier because it’s extremely long, but the point here is that ability of regular people to build and own powerful computers is slipping away. If you go shopping for a relatively powerful computer and wonder what happened to prices, you’re being forced to participate in a bum fight for the scraps the AI companies left behind:
This doesn’t just refer to computers that are capable of being used for audio and video production, streaming, gaming, design, animation, etc.
There’s another reason why powerful equipment is now so unaffordable…
I think the goal is to lock individuals and companies in to paying high monthly fees for AI services by making it mostly impossible to be able to build out AI systems that run locally and privately for a fraction of the cost of what the big AI companies are charging.
I was thinking about trying Claude for a project and I was met with a prompt to enter my mobile phone number. Not optional.
Of course.
*groan*
So, to sum up the options for using powerful AI right now:
* Submit to total surveillance and high monthly fees for access to a state of the art model—which isn’t sustainable at all and will eventually go away, which is why I wanted to try it before it’s over/unattainable.
* Be prepared to shell out the cost of a nice used car to build your own rig that wouldn’t be as good as top offerings, but might be good enough for you. Maybe you care more about privacy than top performance…
* Pay fees to rent someone else’s rig, like in the video below.
I guess there’s another option: Wait until the bubble bursts and then drive forklifts to defunct data centers to harvest tons of GB300s for pennies on the dollar? 🙂
As always, happy computing!
Via: The Hobbyist Miner:
