Nvidia’s RTX 50 MSRP QuakeCon offer gave attendees a limited chance to buy Founders Edition graphics cards at their original list prices, more than a year after the company announced the line. At the GeForce booth during QuakeCon, Nvidia said it would sell RTX 5070, RTX 5080 and RTX 5090 cards at MSRP while supplies lasted.
The sale ran alongside QuakeCon from August 6 through 9 at the Gaylord Texan Resort & Convention Center in Grapevine, Texas. Nvidia calls the in-person program “Verified Priority Access IRL.” It was an event-only offer, not a general reduction in the company’s GPU pricing.
Which RTX 50 cards were sold at MSRP at QuakeCon?
- GeForce RTX 5070 Founders Edition: $549
- GeForce RTX 5080 Founders Edition: $999
- GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition: $1,999
Those were the launch prices Nvidia set when it announced the RTX 50 series at CES 2025, according to Tom’s Hardware. The RTX 5070 Ti, which launched at $749, was not among the models listed for the QuakeCon sale.
The distinction between an MSRP and an actual purchase price is doing a lot of work here. MSRP is the manufacturer’s suggested price, while retail listings can rise above or fall below it. Tom’s Hardware reported contemporaneous lowest tracked prices of $629 for an RTX 5070, $1,289 for an RTX 5080 and $4,381 for an RTX 5090. Those figures were market observations, not Nvidia prices, and the report does not establish that each listing was a directly comparable Founders Edition card.
Still, the nominal gaps were hard to miss: about $80 on the RTX 5070, $290 on the RTX 5080 and $2,382 on the RTX 5090. Several outlets treated the attendee-only MSRP offer as unusual because comparable reported market listings were higher.
Nvidia’s announcement did not turn QuakeCon into a normal retail channel. The cards were available only while on-site stock lasted. The supplied reports do not state the allocation, purchase limits, or number of cards sold.
Nvidia also advertised RTX 5070 Founders Edition prizes for top performers in Quake III Arena RTX Remix and DOOM: The Dark Ages | Revelations challenges. The company said it would distribute GeForce Trading Cards and other giveaways as well.
The offer also revisits a launch problem that did not politely expire with launch week. Tom’s Hardware reported that RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 cards sold out on the day they reached retail shelves in 2025. By August 2026, a convention booth selling a few specified Founders Edition models at the advertised price had become newsworthy on its own.
This story draws on original reporting from Tom's Hardware.
