By the way, you guys are spoiled.

[gibhunter]

60fps, AA+AF, 32 bits. Heck I remember being happy to play Quake2 at 800/600/16 bit on Riva 128 and P2-300 all at 28fps. Then got myself the first TNT and ran it at 1024/768/32 bits at 30fps and thought now I'm living large

 

[high]

I get 120fps in ut2k3 at 1280x1024x32 with 4xAA 16xAF

 

[Amused]

LOL, I remember when I got my first TNT in a new PII450 machine in 1998, and it wasn't fast enough so I added two voodoo2s

I remember how impressed I was playing the first Unreal, and then HalfLife on that machine.

 

[Genx87]

Still remember the day I got my Voodoo2. I went home and fired up battlezone and the difference was like night and day.

I went from 8-10 FPS and software rendering to 36-45 FPS and beautiful 3d.

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: gibhunter
60fps, AA+AF, 32 bits. Heck I remember being happy to play Quake2 at 800/600/16 bit on Riva 128 and P2-300 all at 28fps. Then got myself the first TNT and ran it at 1024/768/32 bits at 30fps and thought now I'm living large

Oh yeah, I owned a computer for 15 or 16 years before 3d video cards were invented! Matter of fact, I slept in front of the only store near my house that sold computer equipment, from the time they closed the night before, just to make sure that I would be able to give them over $200 for a 4 MB(

)3dfx Voodoo (not the Voodoo 2, that was a few years later). I was so happy to get my hands on one, that I did it before I went to the bathroom. I heard later, but have no idea whether it was true or not, that a few of the guys who went to the bathroom first didn't get one that day. This was before there were any cards that would do 2d & 3d, like they all do today. Man, it made such a difference! It was also about a year before Quake (the first one) came out. I was as excited to get that card as I was to get my first modem, a 1200 baud! That was the term back then for bits/sec... I had just gotten a 286 about 3 or 4 months before, and it only took it about 2 or 3 minutes for the 2 of them to connect me to a bulletin board, which is kind of like this is, except it was in DOS, of course. Wow, those were the days, huh?

 

[myocardia]

Man, I hate dial-up... Does anyone who lives where they can get DSL, cable, etc. ever double post?

 

[ponyo]

DSL? ADSL? That's old school. Try VDSL.

 

[JammingJay]

Am I the only one who remembers the good old Commodore days?

 

[Jeff7181]

I remember writing programs on an Apple IIE in 6th grade.

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: Genx87
Still remember the day I got my Voodoo2. I went home and fired up battlezone and the difference was like night and day.

I went from 8-10 FPS and software rendering to 36-45 FPS and beautiful 3d.

Yup, Battlezone came with my Voodoo2, it was a sweet game. Before I got the Voodoo 2, and what made me get it, I had Unreal and Quake 2 which both ran between 10-15fps on my k6-2 300. Popped the V2 in and got 30fps in Unreal and 60ish fps in Quake 2, I was blown away by the speed and the graphics.

 

[Blastman]

Well, I?m not spoiled yet.

I?m running my 9100 64MB - 64bit!!? in 16 bit color to extract more performance out of it.

Running 16 bit in SOF II ouble Helix my fps went from ~ 32 to 47. A 50% increase. Little laggy to nice and smooth. That big of an increase blew me away. : )

 

[vss1980]

I don't think anything will compare to when I first got a 3D graphics card and for the first time switched from software rendering to hardware rendering in Quake2; the change to the screen tint, better definition on all of the objects, better lighting, etc.
It was quite sweet at the time.

EDIT: May I add the first card was a PowerVR Series 1 card (PCX2 revision for those who care). About the performance of a Riva128 card but out several months earlier and cheaper.

 

[gibhunter]

PowerVR and Rendition Verite both were pretty good, but Riva was the first AGP (I believe) and was the first of consumer level cards to offer full OpenGL driver, though it came about 6 months after its release.

 

[Robor]

I too shelled out $200 for a Voodoo 4MB and $250 for a Voodoo2 8MB. Never went as far to SLI the Voodoo2's though. Don't remember exact prices on some but the next upgrade was a Riva TNT 128 then $250 for a Voodoo3 then $300 for a Radeon64 (big mistake) then $300 for a Gainward GF3 64MB Golden Sample then $200 for a Gainward GF4 TI-4200 128MB and now I'm running a $250 Sapphire 9800NP flashed to Pro. Next upgrade will probably be after Doom3 and HalfLife2 are released.

Here's some real gems... Paid $640 for 16MB of EDO RAM, $320 for a DX4-100 and $350 for a 345MB hard drive. Years later when CD burners were released I dumped nearly $500 for a 2X Plextor SCSI CD Burner. I shudder to think how much I've spent on computer hardware over the past 10 years.

Does anyone else remember upgrading their computer because the original Doom wouldn't run fast enough? Funny thing is before Doom I wasn't into comptuers at all. I had a Sega Genesis and never played any games on a computer. Then a guy gave me a shareware version of Doom to load on my girlfriends PC and I was in PC game love. If I saw that guy today I don't know if I would thank him or kick him square in the b@lls! :Q

 

[Mem]

Lol...how far you want me to go back too,I remember the Spectrum/Commodore 64 days,now you had basic sound and very basic graphics and I won`t even bother with fps, but the games were excellent,a lot of the game programmers now could learn a thing or two on playability from those old games.

Getting back to the PC world I remember when I had my 1st 3D card a Diamond Monster Voodoo 4mb ,and first game(3D game) I played was Hexen 2 well just say my eyes and jaw dropped about 4ft to the ground,those days it was more on visuals then speed.

 

[Robor]

Yeah, the first game to make my mouth drop was the original Unreal. When I got out of the ship into the open area I was like, "Whoa!". Then I walked further up to the edge of the tall cliff with the waterfall across the way and I was like, "hey (now ex-wife), you gotta see this!". Now she wasn't into those types of games but even she was like, "holy spit!". Speaking of Unreal, I just picked up Unreal2 for $14.99 out of a used bin so I can try out the new multiplayer patch.

My first comptuer gaming experience was one of the early Wizardry games on an Apple IIe. Anyone who's played it remembers encountering "999 Fluffy Things" and hitting "flee" over and over until you got away! Around the same time a friend had a Tandy. Don't remember the name of the game but we had to load it from a cassette tape to play! Not much to computer gaming back then.

 

[Robor]

Robor the moron made a double post! (edit, not quote you fool!)

 

[Rankor]

I remember playing the full version original Quake (non-GL version) that was activated from a shareware copy on a 2D card (Hercules Dynamite 128 2MB PCI) on an Amd 5x86-133 oc'd to 160 with 8MB of Fast Page RAM at a "playable" 15 fps on 512x384.

Spoiled? No way.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

While we are all waxing nostalgic, I miss my Amiga 2000! The most appropriately named computer ever, for it truly was your girlfriend :heart: I'm currently a recovering computer junkie, I haven't bought any significant parts in months now, and I just sold 1 of my systems yesterday. My 2.35ghz Barton/5800Ultra/1gb ram in dual channel main system will have to keep me going for months to come as I am determined not to fall off the wagon until at least Q2 '04. I was about to click add to cart on a A64 3200+ for $300 and had to wrestle with my hand like Ash in Evil Dead 2, fortunately it hasn't come to the chainsaw yet Wish me luck! and remember, admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery, Hi, my name is Mark and I'm a computer junkie, let the healing begin! *off to edit system rigs page*

 

[Megatomic]

I had lots of old computers (8088 and some even more ancient) but I never really got into gaming until I had my AMD K5-PR75 and an ATI Rage II PCI with 2MB of RAM. I was so impressed with the card that I spent $100 for a 2MB daughter card for it. I was happy with that card until I bought Unreal. Software mode was ok for a few days but I HAD to buy a Diamond Monster II (Voodoo II). It was all downhill after that. I have been smitten with computer hardware for 2 decades now. :heart:

DAPUNISHER, it's only a problem if you are ashamed of it. :beer:

 

[CraigRT]

first time i ever witnessed high FPS was on my TNT2 ultra and K6-3 450

too bad the ALI chipset conflict with the TNT card meant i couldn't play games more than 2 minutes at a time! LOL

I later upgraded to a Celeron 500/kept the TNT2... that was absolutely wicked for FPS.. (Quake2 and 3) i was so very happy!

 

[THUGSROOK]

hehe~
i still play Q3A, but i use the "EXTREME QUALITY MOD" :evil:
1280x1024x32 @ 200+fps

we've come a long way

 

[Mitzi]

I have Voodoo2s in SLI in this machine I'm typing this on. Relax though, its not my gaming rig

I remember getting my first ever Voodoo 1 running with a Matrox Mystique 220...whoo! That was one awsome combination. I actually remember first buying the Matrox M3D (or something...cant remember the name) and I was so disappointed after seeing my mates Voodoo, I sent the Matrox card back and swapped it.

 

[rimshaker]

Same can be said of CPU's and overclocking in the early 90's. Overclocked my 486SX-20 to 33MHz.... but people still would NEVER believe that it ran at true 33mhz... sheeesh, now you encounter the word 'overclock' anywhere you go.

 

[gibhunter]

Originally posted by: Mitzi
I have Voodoo2s in SLI in this machine I'm typing this on. Relax though, its not my gaming rig

I remember getting my first ever Voodoo 1 running with a Matrox Mystique 220...whoo! That was one awsome combination. I actually remember first buying the Matrox M3D (or something...cant remember the name) and I was so disappointed after seeing my mates Voodoo, I sent the Matrox card back and swapped it.

I thought that you're my friend Mark at first. He had exactly the same story, only difference is that his 2D card was the Matrox Millenium 2 and not the Mystique. As you, he ordered the M3D, then PowerVR, then finally he got the Voodoo1, all while I was happily chugging along on my trusty Riva 128 He was OCing that V1 card so bad that he finally fried it, good thing though was that Voodoo2 came out like a week later so he had an excuse to get an SLI setup. Just in time for Unreal too. Those were the times. I actually ended up getting an 8MB Voodoo2 just for Unreal. The hall with shutting down lights and red eyes in darkness is basically the height of my gaming experience. To this day, no game has made such an impression on me. Unreal was truly ahead of its time.