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Graphics cards that you "missed" out on...

paradigm

paradigm

paradigm

Caporegime
Joined
26 Aug 2003
Posts
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Leafy Cheshire
Following on from the "Graphics card History Tree" thread, I thought it would be fun to discuss cards that you always wanted to get hold of, but either couldn't source, or never had the guts to try... Odds are you will now NEVER get to give them a go, but, if you had been given the chance, you would have jumped!

For me, its a toss up of two cards, either the Voodoo 5 6000, or the GeForce FX5800.

I very nearly bought a Voodoo 5 5000 a few years back (just to mess with), but I had a niggling in the back of my mind that its not a 6000, its not got the utter insanity about it, and hence probably wasn't worth the effort with all the hacked drivers and stuff, just to play with a defunct "off the shelf" card.

The FX5800 on the other hand, I only really wanted to "borrow" one of those just to see how insanely noisy they actually were!
 
FX5200 just to see if it really was that bad... never got to use it tho as it so happened it had appropriate replacement components to those I needed to repair my 7950GX2 after accidentally knocking it on the case side :S so it was infact useful...

I always wanted a Voodoo 2 SLI back in the day :D but doesn't sound like I really missed out on much.

ATI Rage Fury Maxx - Just coz of the name (and dual GPU setup heh) but I've never liked ATI Drivers so stayed well away... waited a couple more months and swapped my TNT2 Ultra for a Geforce 2 instead.
 
Oh I don't know about the Voodoo2 SLi, mine were incredible for Quake and Quake II :cool:

I still can't get over how utterly BONKERS the Voodoo 5 6000 was!

voodoo6000.jpg


http://www.x86-secret.com/articles/divers/v5-6000/v56kgb-6.htm
 
The S3 Chrome S27. That's the latest card S3 have produced that actually performed well against anything. In this case, it often beat the GeForce 6600. (gasp)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrome_S27

I wanted to upgrade my 6200 LE (lol) to that but could never get hold of one for a decent price so I waited it out until I got my X1650 Pro.

Another card that sparked my interest, like many, was the 7950 GX2. I don't know why, but that card just looks so cool. Shame it was so expensive 'back in the day' though.

And the other card from the 7950 series peaked my interest, too. There was a 7950 GT by XFX that had this awesome passive cooler, I saw one for £117 one day but I was skint.

Last but not least, the 7900 GTO. That card looked immense for the price.

Edit: How could I forget? The X1650 GT. I wanted one so bad instead of the X1650 Pro but couldn't find any! Bugger!
 
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ATI 9700pro, had a pc at the time but was going through one of those 'na i dont need it really' phase and then the 9800 just made it obsoleate over here even though it was still great competition for it. so i never did source one for reasonable price against a 9800pro.
 
the 7950X2 :D was pretty bonkers considering the heat on that thing. i had neither the money or the cahoonies to get it however :(

that and the 9800pro. must have been ace to buy that card and not have problems for a good time. kind of like the GTX today.
 
I never found the GX2 really ran that hot... tho I did fit the spacer kit and the stock cooling has been off and later put back on with better thermal interface than it came with... now putting some extra vcore through it... then it gets warm :O
 
It was the 7900 GX2 that was the heat, power and noise monster. THAT card was a right POS. :p

7950 GX2 = 8800 GTS 640-like performance.
7900 GX2 = Radiator.
 
aye forgot about the 7900GX2 heh - yeah that was a monster... huge compared to the 7950GX2 and 4x as noisey not to mention the heat...
 
I always wanted a Voodoo Banshee or a RIVA TNT, but never got round to it. Ended up getting a Voodoo 2 for free then eventually moving on to a GF2 MX. :p
 
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For me well it has to be the watercooled Leadtek 8800 Ultra Leviathan.

I just can't get over how cool the name sounds lol.

I know it is still for sale but I don't think I can justify to the mrs the extra £200 over the standard GTX lol.


Also the 6800 Ultra Extreme. Clocked at 450/1200 made it a bit quicker than the standard ultra but for a considerable price increase (thats if you could find one).

I was aware that the ultras could clock this far anyway but there was just something about having the 'ultra extreme' that really appealed to me.
 
Only card I really wanted to try and never did was the Kyro2.

Everything else i've pretty much had... =/
 
Another I wouldn't have minded trying, was the Matrox Parhelia, I was doing a lot of multi-monitor work at the time, and the thought of 3 screens on one card that also offered some degree of gaming performance was quite appealing. They were always stupidly priced though (as with most things Matrox).

The SiS Xabre's were an interesting proposition at the time as well, shame they never took off.

EDIT: Oh, and the XGI Volari V8 DUO!

volariv8.jpg
 
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TBH i dont think i missed out on any card in particular. When i picked up my 128MB Leadtek TI4600 i was tempted to go for the Geforce 3 Ti500 instead but was advised to go for the Ti4600 as it was newer tech.
At the time, i heard that there were always compatibility issues with the Geforce 3 series, not sure whether that was true though.
 
I missed out on the new Geforce 256 cards which in the end trounced the Voodoo 5 :( lol! I had to choose between them both and found the Voodoo 5 perfectly fine until T&L was required which there was a distinct lack of and Max Payne wanted to run terribly :( Thats when I got myself a Geforce 2 GTS
 
HeX said:
Only card I really wanted to try and never did was the Kyro2.

Everything else i've pretty much had... =/
Click to expand...

I really miss using my Kyro. such an unpredictable beast, UT2K4 excelent performance. C+C Generals Abysmal....

still got 5th spot overall on the ORB for 2K1. barton just cant compete with A64.

personally tho, id have really liked to have used a TNT - has integrated SIS530 at the time, got a Viper V550 at a fare, and it never worked :(
 
alwas wanted a Geforce 8600 - was skint at the time, mrs just had a kid, and i coudnt justify the cost.

So I plodded on with m crappy 7300le for a while untill i bite the bullet and got an 8800gts 320mb.
 
The first dedicated graphics card I bought was a Riva TNT2 MX but the machine wouldn't post with it in. The blood, sweat and tears I lost trying to get that thing to work... Ended up giving up and getting a Voodoo3 3000 instead.
 
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