My First PC Graphics Card
- Thread starter KiraXD
- Start date
ByakuyaEXT
Neo Member
GeForce 2
in an 350 MHz Intel Pentium 2
Men i was happy that WarCraft III was working just fine
in an 350 MHz Intel Pentium 2
Men i was happy that WarCraft III was working just fine
As far as i remember, my first 3D graphics card was a "3dfx voodoo 4mb". (bought because of Resident Evil game) It was only for 3d, not the usual desktop experience. It had a VGA cable input connector from the "usual" graphic card, and a output connector to the monitor. Some kind of a "passthrough mode".
But before that, there were different graphic cards, they were not built into motherboards.
But before that, there were different graphic cards, they were not built into motherboards.
IrrelevantAlex
Member
First card was in Jan 2011, a GTX 460. Just upgrade this month to a GTX 760
Now to see what's a good upgrade for my CPU is, it's a AMD Phenom II X4 965
Now to see what's a good upgrade for my CPU is, it's a AMD Phenom II X4 965
I'm pretty sure I had something before the MX440 but for the life of me I cannot remember what, so here we go...
The GeForce MX440 a pretty basic card even back in the day I believe but it was enough for me to play Counter Strike well and that's all I really wanted then.
Then came the legendary ATi 9800 Pro. This thing kept me going through vanilla WoW until I was really aching for an upgrade.
The HD 3850. Again, I was on a budget and this little beauty kept me going through my WoW phase. I still have it kicking around in the boy's PC coupled with a Athlon 64 X2 5000+ he plays Team Fortress on it.
Another budget card the HD 6850. Pretty good card considering the price, it's still in my desktop machine and will play most things reasonably well now.
And we come to my current card. The Sapphire 7870XT, it gave me a bit of hassle when I first got it due to an insufficient PSU which once replaced let this card sing. It's not the best or fastest card out there by a stretch but it serves me well and provides amazing performance for the price.
I'm not really an AMD fanatic, one of the things I usually factor into a build most is cost. I usually build on a budget and want to get the most out of my money which is where AMD cards shine.
The GeForce MX440 a pretty basic card even back in the day I believe but it was enough for me to play Counter Strike well and that's all I really wanted then.
Then came the legendary ATi 9800 Pro. This thing kept me going through vanilla WoW until I was really aching for an upgrade.
The HD 3850. Again, I was on a budget and this little beauty kept me going through my WoW phase. I still have it kicking around in the boy's PC coupled with a Athlon 64 X2 5000+ he plays Team Fortress on it.
Another budget card the HD 6850. Pretty good card considering the price, it's still in my desktop machine and will play most things reasonably well now.
And we come to my current card. The Sapphire 7870XT, it gave me a bit of hassle when I first got it due to an insufficient PSU which once replaced let this card sing. It's not the best or fastest card out there by a stretch but it serves me well and provides amazing performance for the price.
I'm not really an AMD fanatic, one of the things I usually factor into a build most is cost. I usually build on a budget and want to get the most out of my money which is where AMD cards shine.
Same.
Tossed that shit and got the OG Diamond Monster 3d, the undisputed king of the first-gen 3d accelerators.
I don't think we've really seen a jump quite as big as playing Tomb Raider at 320x240x8bpp grainy and 15 fps, and then this little addon board gives you 640x480x16bpp at 60 fps.
The thing that promises to provide the same kind of shift is Oculus Rift.
Rawket Lawnchair
Member
A GeForce 3 64mb I think. 11 years ago.
Upgraded to a GeForce FX 5900 later.
Then I went through integrated graphics, a GT555M, and a GTX780 which I have right now.
Upgraded to a GeForce FX 5900 later.
Then I went through integrated graphics, a GT555M, and a GTX780 which I have right now.
Skyr
Member
1st: Geforce 3 Ti 200
(before that a Trident SVGA but I dont even know if this counts as a graphic Card and it was in a pre built pc.
2nd: Radeon 9800pro
3rd: GeForce 7800GT
4th: GeForce GTX470
5th: ?????
Im kinda waiting for Infos what System will be the best for Oculus Rift as im really looking forward for that.
(before that a Trident SVGA but I dont even know if this counts as a graphic Card and it was in a pre built pc.
2nd: Radeon 9800pro
3rd: GeForce 7800GT
4th: GeForce GTX470
5th: ?????
Im kinda waiting for Infos what System will be the best for Oculus Rift as im really looking forward for that.
snickothemule
Member
I remember playing Half Life on this, I can't remember if performance was good or not. I'll presume it wasn't too crash hot. I remember the demo being a lot of fun.
Next card was an FX5900XTV from Albatron. Came with Duke Nukem Manhatten Project which was kinda cool. I remember playing UT2003/4, Far Cry, Blood Rayne, Tony Hawk Underground, and Half Life 2 on it. I remember it wasn't quite ballsy enough to run HL2 with DX9 features, but ran DX8 like a champ. Was a pretty decent little card, for the family computer it did alright.
The first card I bought myself was the MSI 560ti Twin Frozr II, great card that now sits in my HTPC.
Now I run an EVGA 760 2gb Superclocked card, it does a tremendous job.
LicenceToK1ll
Member
I frequently played some PC games on prebuild machines but got serious in 2006 with:
Radeon 2900XT
Was a pretty crazy card(huge chip,hot and 512bit membus). It ran Crysis decently with some tweaks, was blown away by the graphics,it was epic.
Radeon 2900XT
Was a pretty crazy card(huge chip,hot and 512bit membus). It ran Crysis decently with some tweaks, was blown away by the graphics,it was epic.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
My first GPU was a Riva TNT2. From some lame "Intel" whatever was in that old computer. It made UT99 sing, dat 1280x1024 res was pretty smexy. Looking back at it, it seems I made the right call. I was kind of looking at a Voodoo 3, since my friend had one and the Glide plugins for the n64 emulators ran so fucking nice.
Next computer came with a Geforce 3 Ti200, upgraded that sucker to a Radeon 9600. And my current computer went from a Geforce 8800GT to a Radeon HD5870,
Currently looking to upgrade to Nvidia, since AMD is kinda dumb
Next computer came with a Geforce 3 Ti200, upgraded that sucker to a Radeon 9600. And my current computer went from a Geforce 8800GT to a Radeon HD5870,
Currently looking to upgrade to Nvidia, since AMD is kinda dumb
freshVeggie
Member
This badboy was my first and last GPU I ever bought.
Nvidia Geforce4 440MX 64MB
It brought me tons of games at good performance.
Nvidia Geforce4 440MX 64MB
It brought me tons of games at good performance.
My first was the Hercules Graphics Adapter. I loved this thing because it could emulate CGA graphics, and run color games that otherwise would not run on a monochrome system. I played a lot of Sierra Adventure games this way. Well, a lot of games _period_.
My first card with 3D acceleration was a 3DFX Voodoo Banshee, which gave me fond memories of Quake 2 Deathmatch, Half-Life, and co-op Hidden & Dangerous. When I finally retired it, the board behind the GPU was discolored from the heat it produced. No surprise then that this was to be my last passively cooled graphics card.
My first card with 3D acceleration was a 3DFX Voodoo Banshee, which gave me fond memories of Quake 2 Deathmatch, Half-Life, and co-op Hidden & Dangerous. When I finally retired it, the board behind the GPU was discolored from the heat it produced. No surprise then that this was to be my last passively cooled graphics card.
Dice
Pokémon Parentage Conspiracy Theorist
It was a long time ago... I think it was a Powercolor something, but that might have been the motherboard. Then I got a Voodoo Banshee something (now I remember! yes, I edited this in) Dat GL Quake. It was a new era. But what I distinctly remember was getting a S3 Savage3D. This. My god. I think I upgraded from it to a Monster 3D II, or was it the other way around? A TNT2 might have been in here somewhere. Then a GeForce 2 MX400, then Radeon HD 4850, and now R9 270X.
It's hard to remember exactly in those early days because my uncle built computers for a living and was basically giving me stuff for free as he would have leftovers from upgrading his own gaming PC to the top-of-the-line, which I think he did primarily so I could join him in LAN parties as I was one of the few worthy competitors he had.
It's hard to remember exactly in those early days because my uncle built computers for a living and was basically giving me stuff for free as he would have leftovers from upgrading his own gaming PC to the top-of-the-line, which I think he did primarily so I could join him in LAN parties as I was one of the few worthy competitors he had.
muzzymate
Member
My first graphics card was built into a Commodore Colt, so I'll skip that one. Space Quest 3 rocked that system with 4 colors!
My first real GPU was a STB Velocity Riva 128.
My first gaming PC that I built myself had a 3dfx Voodoo 3
My second computer build had a Geforce 4 MX 440.
I then switched to console gaming during the Playstation 2 and Xbox 360 era. It was a long, long drought of PC gaming until just a few months ago. I put a Radeon 5670 in a several year old Dell Optiplex to get my feet wet in the space again. Steam Big Picture mode, when it works, has been serving me well for how old all the equipment is. If something comes out that needs more power, I'll just get it on my Xbox One.
My first real GPU was a STB Velocity Riva 128.
My first gaming PC that I built myself had a 3dfx Voodoo 3
My second computer build had a Geforce 4 MX 440.
I then switched to console gaming during the Playstation 2 and Xbox 360 era. It was a long, long drought of PC gaming until just a few months ago. I put a Radeon 5670 in a several year old Dell Optiplex to get my feet wet in the space again. Steam Big Picture mode, when it works, has been serving me well for how old all the equipment is. If something comes out that needs more power, I'll just get it on my Xbox One.
Unknown One
Member
You can see the evolution of the coolers as graphic cards progress. I forgot all about the coolers that aren't the size of the whole card.
That was mine too! Though I think it might have been a 16MB version. I then did my first upgrade, to a GeForce 2 GTS! I don't think I've moved away from NVIDIA since, apart from on work/media centre machines.
ChainsawFilms
Member
Great thread 
Matrox Millenium 2 was the first dedicated card I bought.
3DFX Voodoo was next - Diamond Monster I believe.
Got a little carried away and picked up a couple of Voodoo 2 12mb cards, running in SLI. Those were the days!
I had a Riva TNT2 a little later.
GeForce 256.
GeForce 2.
Then I went mainly to console gaming as I couldn't pump as much money into regular PC builds
Since I've had a 7800, 8800GTS, and I'm now running a 560ti.
Matrox Millenium 2 was the first dedicated card I bought.
3DFX Voodoo was next - Diamond Monster I believe.
Got a little carried away and picked up a couple of Voodoo 2 12mb cards, running in SLI. Those were the days!
I had a Riva TNT2 a little later.
GeForce 256.
GeForce 2.
Then I went mainly to console gaming as I couldn't pump as much money into regular PC builds
Since I've had a 7800, 8800GTS, and I'm now running a 560ti.
I remember how awesome my All-In-Wonder card was from ATI though. It was one of the coolest things to be surfing the net and in a tiny cornor of my screen i had cable TV stations playing in a flexible size borderless screen anywhere i wanted to put it. Mostly used for NFL games and other sports type broadcasts from my cable.
Also during the time is when i began messing around with using component out to very early HDTV's at the time. It was the ultimate living room home theater media center...having one of my PC's connected in the living room in the very early 2000's. A lot of people that came over really didnt think it was a great idea...and understandable because at the time stuff like that was alient and media centers in the living room were pretty much not even heard of at the time but fortunately for me..i was enjoying it on my secondary PC which was high end and i turned it into a HTPC via component output from the graphics card...no HDMI at the time. I had a really nice Sony CRT HDTV that i used with that HTPC...was beautiful for the time.
On a side note: I remember probably mid 2000's of a laptop CPU that was a bad ass overclocker as a desktop CPU...i forget which company made it...AMD Athlon or Intel...my friend had it..but i remember how he raved about it so much...and like i said all i know is that it was a laptop cpu that could be used in a desktop mobo and it overclocked to insane levels with easy effort. Maybe someone here knows which im trying to remember?
Also during the time is when i began messing around with using component out to very early HDTV's at the time. It was the ultimate living room home theater media center...having one of my PC's connected in the living room in the very early 2000's. A lot of people that came over really didnt think it was a great idea...and understandable because at the time stuff like that was alient and media centers in the living room were pretty much not even heard of at the time but fortunately for me..i was enjoying it on my secondary PC which was high end and i turned it into a HTPC via component output from the graphics card...no HDMI at the time. I had a really nice Sony CRT HDTV that i used with that HTPC...was beautiful for the time.
On a side note: I remember probably mid 2000's of a laptop CPU that was a bad ass overclocker as a desktop CPU...i forget which company made it...AMD Athlon or Intel...my friend had it..but i remember how he raved about it so much...and like i said all i know is that it was a laptop cpu that could be used in a desktop mobo and it overclocked to insane levels with easy effort. Maybe someone here knows which im trying to remember?
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
.
lol not sure we are going that far back in this thread but since you mentioned your Tandy RL000. I'll mention how bad ass my Amiga 500 was...and i have a kick ass mom that allowed me to buy it at the age of 12 years old...with my dad's credit card, my mom ordered it for me after begging her for it and boy my dad was royally pissed when he seen the bill on his credit card lol
I had so much fun with that Amiga though....i blew everything else in that era out of the water in terms of gaming.
This was my first graphics card. I bought it in Game, I think if I remember correctly for about 150 quid. To play Carmageddon 2 and Half Life. It was like night and day. Carmageddon was a giant pixelly mess and Half Life was a slide show before installing the card. I paired it with the worst possible processor you could buy though, a cyrix 233, it still worked great as long as I didnt turn any of the settings up.
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
,