What do you think was the most influential card in the last few years.

[Kaapstad]

I would say it was the original Titan, the reason being that before it arrived we were using HD 7970s and GTX 680s on 28nm and suddenly we had a 50% or more increase in performance.

This in turn forced AMD to launch the 290 series which led to NVidia having to reduce the GTX 780 prices and launch the 780ti.

The reason I have said the Titan above has nothing to do with the fact it also comes with 6gb of vram or the compute functions as most people will not use these. It is just the huge boost in speed the Titan gave when compared to any other single GPU around at the time.

NVidia have now launched the Titan Black but compared to other cards that are now available like the 780ti or 290X, the Titan Black hardly stands out on performance alone and I think it can not be considered influential in the same way the original was.

 

[vsg28]

I would say it was the Titan or 7970 for the same reason: They both ushered in a higher price for the flagship that was previously unheard of and now we consumers are somehow used to the fact that $1000 or £700+ cards are ok.

 

[Confused Stu]

For me, it's the 5870. Double the performance of the 4870, massively lower idle power and temperature, and the ability to game on 3 screens (or more for the Eyefinity version of the card) made this a game changer in my book.

 

[straxusii]

I would say it was the original Titan, the reason being that before it arrived we were using HD 7970s and GTX 680s on 28nm and suddenly we had a 50% or more increase in performance.

I've got to disagree. The reason the titan did that was because Nvidia couldn't manufacture the 'proper' 680 at the time and were just lucky they could call the 660 a 680 as overclocked it could compete with a 7970.

I agree with another poster 5870 for me. First to market and a solid performer with DX10 to boot, Nvidia were hot and late with the 480 which could only manage ~10% over the 5870.

 

[edgedemon]

8800GT - shook the entire market up as it was an amazing pricepoint for what was then a very capable card

 

[jh30uk]

8800GTX (big brother Ultra a little later), lasted a long time before being bettered, rate today.

 

[funt]

8800GTX (big brother Ultra a little later), lasted a long time before being bettered, rate today.

This

Loved my 8800.

 

[Orangey]

^^ In the last few years

g80 was almost a decade ago

 

[jh30uk]

^^ In the last few years

g80 was almost a decade ago

Few = 3 or more.

November 2006, 7.5 years ago and seems like yesterday to peeps old enough to have bawhair.

 

[Darujhistan]

8800GTX (big brother Ultra a little later), lasted a long time before being bettered, rate today.

This.

 

[carlazai]

8800 was an amazing card that only struggled for me when bad company 2 came out. A friend still has one and is good for console port games to this day at 1600 res

 

[Davedree]

I've got to disagree. The reason the titan did that was because Nvidia couldn't manufacture the 'proper' 680 at the time and were just lucky they could call the 660 a 680 as overclocked it could compete with a 7970.

I agree with another poster 5870 for me. First to market and a solid performer with DX10 to boot, Nvidia were hot and late with the 480 which could only manage ~10% over the 5870.

totally agree with this, I believe the 7970 although marketed as a high end card, was also mid range. Bearing in mind the 6970 was cut down from its true potential due to the cancelled 32nm.

28nm was always going to be hanging around for a long time, so both Nvidia and Amd played it safe at first until they could make the full fat 290/780 etc.

 

[TheRealDeal]

Few = 3 or more.

November 2006, 7.5 years ago and seems like yesterday to peeps old enough to have bawhair.

Personally i think if the op (Kaap) meant as long ago as G80 his suggestion would not be the Titan

 

[Rroff]

Would have to agree that the 8800GTX and 8800GT have still been the most influential cards of the last few years even though almost a decade old.

The leap in performance and feasibility of many shader effects that previously either weren't possible or not possible with decent performance pushed rendering tech forward more than anything since and the impact of those cards is only really starting to fade away in the last couple of years or so.

Following on from that the GTX480 due to making tessellation feasible - while not a big fan of tessellation myself and its not been overly used itself it seemed to be the catalyst for developers pushing related/newer tech.

The 290 influencing the 780 price drop is another valid one in there.

Overall though I don't think we've really seen hugely influential cards over the last few years - the Titan had a bit of an impact on multi display gaming due to the sudden leap in what was viable performance wise with multi display/high resolutions but rendering tech wise not so much as it was in some ways an anomaly and developers wouldn't focus on it at the expense of more mainstream cards in that regard.

totally agree with this, I believe the 7970 although marketed as a high end card, was also mid range. Bearing in mind the 6970 was cut down from its true potential due to the cancelled 32nm.

28nm was always going to be hanging around for a long time, so both Nvidia and Amd played it safe at first until they could make the full fat 290/780 etc.

While theres nothing to confirm it - "leaked" "7870" slides (which are almost certainly real) had the 7970 specs and projected release date on them. (Before the actual releases).

 

[Yaayuh!]

In the last few years, i can't help but think of the Titan and also the 290/290X.

The reason for the Titan is the same as Kaap said, that sudden increase in performance and VRAM can create glorious gaming PCs (at a cost) right out of nowhere.

The 290/290X is more of a "Look what you can do with so little money" a long with Mantle and True Audio, thinking outside the box and looking elsewhere.

Both i would say are pretty darn influential in different ways.

 

[Nelly]

8800GTX great card, imported my OCZ one from the USA, didn't upgrade till 2 years later when the GTX 295 came out, usually buy a new card every year.

 

[Five.Stars]

I would say it was the Titan or 7970 for the same reason: They both ushered in a higher price for the flagship that was previously unheard of and now we consumers are somehow used to the fact that $1000 or £700+ cards are ok.

The 7970 never ushered in a higher price for a flagship card at all. It launched at ~£420. I bought an X1900XTX in 2005 for £430. The fact that the previous few AMD/ ATI flagship cards were launched at a slightly lower price point was more of an anomaly than the price of the 7970.

 

[ubersonic]

I've got to disagree. The reason the titan did that was because Nvidia couldn't manufacture the 'proper' 680 at the time and were just lucky they could call the 660 a 680 as overclocked it could compete with a 7970.

At launch the GTX680 was out in front of the HD7970 which struggled to pull ahead of the GTX670, it wasn't until after numerous driver improvements it could match or surpass the GTX680 and not until the launch of the 7970-GHz edition that it pulled out a noticeable lead.

-----------------------------------------

My vote goes to the 8800-GTS 512MB, launched in late 2007 it was ahead of it's time, so much so it returned as the 9800GTX in 2008, doubled up as the 9800-GX2, then following a brief die shrink stint at the 9800-GTX+ it returned again in 2009 as the GTS250, and was still considered a mid range card lol.

 

[bru]

I've got to disagree. The reason the titan did that was because Nvidia couldn't manufacture the 'proper' 680 at the time and were just lucky they could call the 660 a 680 as overclocked it could compete with a 7970.

Err if Nvidia couldn't manufacture a proper large chip then how come they were able to make the titan


Most influential card over the last few years, Hmmm. Well discounting the 8800 as I agree with others that it is going back to far.

I would say the prize should go jointly to the mid range concept 680 for being able to beat the top dog from the other side the original 7970, and of course the 7970 itself for being introduced with the rather low clocks that allowed the 680 to come in where it did.

 

[Yaayuh!]

My vote goes to the 8800-GTS 512MB, launched in late 2007 it was ahead of it's time, so much so it returned as the 9800GTX in 2008, doubled up as the 9800-GX2, then following a brief die shrink stint at the 9800-GTX+ it returned again in 2009 as the GTS250, and was still considered a mid range card lol.

People should stop voting old cards. They were not released recently. If you can't think of one, just say - recent cards have not been influential.