AMD is discontinuing the production and distribution of reference Radeon RX Vega 64 and 56 graphics cards, reportscomputerbase.de. All major retailers in Germany have stopped carrying the reference designed versions of both cards, in favor of custom AIB models.

AMD Stops Shipping Reference RX Vega 64 & 56 Cards In Favor Of Custom Models

We have yet to see this take place among US e-tailers. In fact, neither does Amazon or Newegg appear to have any custom AIB versions of neither RX Vega in stock, as both e-tailers continue to only carry the reference RX Vega 64 and 56 designs. Although this is expected to change over the coming weeks, as more AIBs ship custom models and as the existing inventory of reference cards runs out.

ComputerBase cites several sources and reports that AMD has already stopped shipping reference Vegas in favor of allocating more Vega 10 GPUs for the company's add-in-board partners to build custom designs with. Asus, Gigabyte, Sapphire, PowerColor & XFX have all debuted custom versions of AMD's RX Vega 64 and 56 graphics cards, the majority of which are already shipping to retailers world-wide, including stores like Best Buy and Microcenter.

It's not yet clear whether AMD will resume production of any specific RX Vega design at a later date. With 2017 coming to a close very soon, the company is no doubt already busy with the new 12nm Ryzen & Vega chips expected in the first half of next year.

Refreshed Vega parts are expected to include the all new Vega 11 mid-range GPU replacing Polaris 10/20 and the RX 580/70 series. Additionally, a faster and more power efficient iteration of the Vega 10 GPU i.e. Vega 20 could also be in the works to debut some time in the first half of next year.

These refreshed parts will have to hold the line against NVIDIA's upcoming Volta cards, which are expected to debut in the first half of next year. That is until Navi makes landfall, which is believed to be happening some time in the second half of 2018 around August. All in all, 2018 is shaping up to be a pretty exciting year for graphics with Volta, 12nm Vega, 7nm Navi all making their debut in one form or another.

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