If you're looking for Black Friday deals on the RTX 40 series, you won't find just any graphics card. In fact, you'll probably be lucky to find an Nvidia RTX 4090 or RTX 4080 in stock. But even machines with Nvidia's latest GPUs have Black Friday gaming PC sales (open in new tab). [In fact, iBuyPower is shipping an RTX 4090-powered gaming PC (opens in new tab) for less than the price of an in-stock RTX 4090 on sale today at Newegg.

And, as in years past, the best bet for getting the latest and greatest graphics card and for getting it for close to MSRP is to buy it built into a pre-built gaming PC from a reputable system builder.

PC builders have a lot of clout when it comes to ordering GPUs in bulk, and you have a better chance of getting newer, rarer graphics cards than if you wander into a microcenter in an afternoon. That said, I'm sure I've seen photos on reddit of an RTX 4090 strapped to the passenger seat of a car on the way home from an impromptu shopping spree.

That's why these folks can offer RTX 4090 and RTX 4080-based gaming PCs that ship in two to three weeks.

In other words, there is still lead time. But given that custom-built machines typically have a two-week wait, an extra week should not be a problem. I understand the desire to get a shiny new one now, though.