The A100 came out 5.5 years ago and is still the staple for many AI/ML workloads. Even AI hardware just doesn’t depreciate that quickly.

Users are waiting for Blackwell. Then Rubin. CRWV depreciates GPUs over 6 years. Rails last a lot longer.

Don't they degrade physically from being run at full blast 24/7 for so many years?

Not nearly as badly if you keep them cool.

Unless you care about FLOP/Watt, which big players definitely do.

No more than 5-10% of the hourly cost of an A100 will be in actual power. It’s not a big factor.

This. There’s even a market for them being built (DRW).