AMD Combat Crates

AMD is planning to sell a new product called the Combat Crate, which is an all-in-one bundle consisting of a Ryzen processor plus motherboard and Radeon graphics card.

It’s certainly a good idea for DIY PC gamers looking to build a new system. It offers the convenience of having all major components in one box and you get to save a few bucks in the process on the bundle.

The first Combat Crate has been produced in conjunction with MSI, but there may be more in the pipeline from other manufacturers. The first bundle spotted on Amazon includes a first-gen Ryzen 5 1600 with cooler, an MSI  B350 Tomahawk motherboard and most importantly—an MSI Radeon RX 580 Armor OC card. The entire bundle costs $599.

It can be a very effective way to make sure that GPUs land in the hands of actual gamers rather than miners, who tend to buy graphics cards by the dozen and suck the graphics card supply dry. Bundling graphics cards with other components like we’re seeing with the AMD Combat Crate hinders miners’ ability to buy graphics cards in bulk. A practice that was largely responsible for the catastrophic GPU supply shortage over the past nine months.