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What was your most awesome video card purchase ever ?

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Radeon 9700 All In Wonder

Played all games at high settings, let me record television. I still have it laying around somewhere.
 
9700 Pro, by far.

My 8800 GTS 640mb lasted me a LONG time, just had to be baked in the oven a few times.

Also the 6950 was a worthy mention because of the unlock to 6970. That was pretty cool at the time, but not a particularly awesome card.
 
Best, in order:
Riva TNT 1
Voodoo 2 12MB
GTX 970
HD 6950 CF
8800 GT 512MB

Worst:
GeForce 1, had poor IQ.
9800 GX-2, glitchy and disappointing performance.
 
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For me, it was the 3Dlabs Wildcat Realizm 800 - 1 VSU, 2 VPU, 512 + 128 MB GDDR3, 512-bit memory interface, x16 PCIe. It changed everything for me creating art. It cost a pretty penny back in the day, I think 2004 or 5. Sold it on ebay for 150.00 last year. Great Linux drivers.
http://pics.computerbase.de/7/9/0/7/6.jpg
 
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Radeon 6670 DDR3 (yeah that one) and 7850. Before that, I had only ever gamed on ~$400 general use laptops. Those tended get ~20 FPS in Oblivion with lowest settings + performance mods, still fun, somehow. I also played Fallout 3, but was only able to use melee weapons effectively.
 
Probably my current GTX 280, since I got it for $300 at launch (normally $650) due to the MS cashback program and got six years of use from it in a variety of games. I'm finally replacing it now. The previous gaming cards I had were X1900XTX, 7800GT SLI, 6800GT, Geforce 3, Voodoo 3, TNT and Voodoo 2. All of them were great for their time except the SLI setup, which resulted in lots of headaches and wasted time getting games to work properly.
 
Yeah, I can't imagine using SLI all those years ago, considering how many headaches there still can be today.
 
1998 Rendition Verite 8MB PCI - my first 3D accelerator (combined with 2D) played Quake 2 with a very stable OpenGL ICD

2000 Matrox G400 16MB AGP played Max Payne (non-T&L) with some of the best IQ around

2009 - 2 X 512MB Geforce 9800GT single slot in SLI. Played Batman: Arkham Asylum and later Starcraft 2 WoL at respectable framerates although put out quite a bit of heat.
 
Well technically not a purchase but my two 3Dfx voodoo 2 12mb in 1998 in SLI to play Wargasm (I borrowed one from a stand I was interviewing 3dfx guys at) and their PR sent the other. That's when the doors of perception opened and I could see tomorrow rendered beautifully (for it's time). I have to say the power and silence (near) of my two 295x2s still impresses me, flying over Altis at dawn in my Warthog looks eye wateringly beautiful and my x850 PE for BF2 at launch again blew me away. Those cards look like pathetic puny children's toys compared to today's offerings when you see the pics online. PS Voodoo 2 SLI worked. Period-the original and best before Nvidia bought them. Best single card, 9700 Pro for its blistering performance and friendly price.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hs-eTjHU01w Lol
 
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8800GTS 320 MB

My first videocard purchase ever in my first computer build. Going from non-gaming laptops to that was a god send.
 
Teizo said:
ATI 9800 Pro. Hands down. I still have it for keeps sake.
Click to expand...

Same here, flashed mine to a XT BIOS and let 'er rip.

My first foray was with a 6MB Canopus Voodoo. That was mindblowing at the time. The continuous and rapid improvements in PCs around that time were staggering. I still occasionally have nightmares about setting jumpers and messing with config.sys.
 
2x 680s. Saved me from the hell hole of 2x 7970's that almost stopped me gaming altogether. Not the most impressive of upgrades but the grand scheme of things the most important.
 
Diamond Monster 3D was my first and best card in a Pentium 75 with a overdrive at 198MHz 66x3
.
Radeon X800 XTPE was my best agp card.

My 8800gtx saw the most use and was better then my 8800gt sli setup.
 
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Best card has definitely been my old Radeon HD 4830. Maxed out bioshock and Guild Wars no problem and it's still running today in my brothers computer. He maxes out LoL and Neverwinter and even played BF4 on low with its puny 512MB of ram.
 
All of the graphic cards here are amazing, but i'd like to mention mine which gave me the best performance for my pc budget when i was building a good pc, it is ATI Sapphire 6670HD DDR5. i still play games with high-medium settings with it.
 
Let's see if I can remember my graphics history (I might go out of order):

Riva TNT2
Vooodoo 5 5500 (best PCI card at the time)
Elsa Gladiac GeForce 3 (terrible timing - high prices and the G4 series just hit)
9700 non pro (worst card, had too many issues with it). I think this is when I first tried RAID 0 with WD Raptor drives... was OMG fast at the time. Sold the entire PC to a friend.

I bought my dad a nvidia 5950 (best PCI card at the time that I could find)

I then bought myself a 6800GT desktop card but decided I should just go mobile. Took it back.

A little later I got a laptop with a 6800GT mobile in it... it played everything and I used it for years through college. I eventually threw together a cheap desktop but I don't recall what video card I put in it... I might have thrown one of my old cards in it.

Then I got myself an 8800 gts 320mb. Worked fine... actually worked up until last year or so when I had to toss it from my HTPC when it finally quit.

I then bought a complete desktop that had a AMD 5770 in it. I really liked that card but the fan died.. I repasted it... worked for a while then quit again.

I then got a 6850 that didn't work right, traded it up for a 6870 1gb. Used that for a year or so and then...

Got me a 560 TI 448. Didn't notice too much of an improvement but my wife needed a good card so she got the 6870 from above. She was using that 8800 GTS 320mb from a few steps up that just wasn't cutting it.

Then I got the 670 gtx 2gb... worked fine until just last week I treated myself to a 970 gtx and let my wife have the 670 for her 1080p setup.

A little after I got the 670 I got an Alienware with a 650 in it. Works fine for the resolution it plays on.

I'm sure I missed 1 or 2 cards. But man I've wasted a lot of money on computer hardware 🙂

BEST: Voodoo 5 5500 (for quake 2) or 6800 GT mobile
WORST: 9700 non pro (just too many bugs)
 
Nah, from what I can tell you've gotten plenty of use out of your cards and found ways to keep em busy for years. I've never had a card die on me, a testament to a truly obnoxious upgrade cycle !
 
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