What was the most significant gfx card of its time?

Vampyromaniac · Aug 16, 2004, 08:26 PM

Which desktop 3D graphics card would you say was the most significant of its time?
You can choose more than one, and of course there's Other, since I just listed what popped into my mind.
Just post your card and the reasons you think it was so major.

.

RVachon · Aug 16, 2004, 08:45 PM

I would think the Voodoo would be it since it was the first "official" 3D accelerator. 2nd would be the 9700 since it was the biggest jump in performance over any other at that time.

No_Style · Aug 16, 2004, 08:50 PM

9700 PRO and 9500 PRO. These two cards catapulted ATI to what they are today

The 9500 PRO's price/performance ratio was through the roof and it certainly rocked.

TwistedMetal · Aug 16, 2004, 09:11 PM

I voted for Voodoo, Voodoo 2, and 9700 Pro.

The Voodoo Series was leading the market for a long time, Glide was really taking off, games were being made in Glide. Voodoo/2 also had good OpenGL performance.

9700 Pro was a huge seller and a power card for it's time. It can still hold it's own as of today, it's a solid card with great performance. I wasn't really big on ATI until the 9700 Pro came out, in reviews the it blew away any card that was thrown at it. That made he decide to get a 9700 Pro and I have liked ATI ever since.

Chaos · Aug 16, 2004, 09:14 PM

Radeon 9500 NP

Zardon · Aug 16, 2004, 09:19 PM

close call.

9700 springs to mind as the first card to offer playable gaming with AA and AF, and then we had the Voodoo 2 in SLI mode which was groundbreaking but after much debate I had to go for the original Voodoo, I was around when the whole PowerVR v Voodoo was going on and the day I bought my first voodoo was a day ill never forget.

Asmoday · Aug 16, 2004, 09:23 PM

I voted by mistake on the geforce ddr....because i thougt about the first geforce...the one after the tnt2 ultra, wasn't that the first gfx to support t&l?
Oh...i also voted on the 9700...

**MIG-31** · Aug 16, 2004, 09:24 PM

first pc i had with any significant power in the graphics derartment were a voodoo 3 8mb.then swiched to a geforce 2 64mb pci,due to the voodoo were an onboard chip with no seperate agp slot.

evergreen · Aug 16, 2004, 10:01 PM

Definitely the original Voodoo!!! There was no 3D before the Voodoo. 9700 is definitely a banging card, but I have to mention the 8500 as my second choice. Compared to anything less than a 9700, it's still kickin' @ss - 2200 MTexels/s fill rate & 8.80 GB/s memory bandwidth...

~~HawK~~ · Aug 16, 2004, 10:25 PM

PVR PCX2 was better then Voodoo period.
PVR Kyro I & II first card that outsold the NV GF2MX in many (european) country's.
Sadly in a strange move STMicro stopped making Kyro's chips for unknown reasons, wonder what chip they are baking now..

Judas · Aug 17, 2004, 01:42 AM

Voodoo 1 would be probably the first seeing as it just provided the beginning of capable 3d accelerated gameing.. C'mon, everyone shoudl agree that glide at that time was just awesome.. and actually today... in alot of cases.. still provides the most fleunt gameplay yet

at the nearly same time, PVR had introduced the PCX2, although a bit late for the pc market... it provided quite a good preformance.. however, had it's setback with capabilities and some cases.. preformance was also hindered.... The IDEA however is what really should be considered as being absalute significant..... True HSR, Tile Based Rendering...

Next would probably be the TNT to provide ..(albite SLOW) 32 bit color rendering... slow as molases... but still.. a start... after that... the first to provide Hardware TnL.... however, I do beleive PVR had already build a VERY powerful hardware TnL but was only available for Arcades...

Kyro 1 and 2, First cards from PVR that were pretty well Flawless.... since the first release... simple bug fixes were made to fix problems mostly related to how games or programs were coded badly, taking shortcuts that the DirectX system wasn't really ment to do, skipping or applying certain code were it would work on All other cards other then TBR cards....

With the power of a Voodoo 3 3000 (166mhz) for all the kyro 2's EXCEPT the hercules 4500 64mb AGP card similare to the power of a TNT (175mhz)... the card could spit out image quality that currently surpases ATI even today, and that was default.. it got better if you wanted

.... the speed however was even more shocking, a in MANY cases, a Geforce 2 Ultra would be left behind.... in generally every possible single case.. the geforce 2 MX400 was always left behind leaving the geforce 2 Pro and ultra to battle. This considering the fact that the kyro 2 didn't have hardware TnL... a bonus on top of it all was it's absalutely excellent and well ran Profiler build into the drivers.... (oh, how i miss them)... and to top it off.. any game that would only allow 16 bit color.... would be automatically upsampled to near 32 bit color due to the internal True Color Rendering process and nature of the PVR tech. Why didn't this card get more notice.... well, 3dmark scores always proved to be no were representitive of real world gameing was like...

However, the pvr tech really brushed Nvidia the wrong way, Hawk could probably find the PDF the nvidia published with false information and outright attacks at the pvr tech.... sad....

Will we see another PVR card? i myself would have to say yes... when? that's a different..... who knows.... why haven't anyone heard anything about PowerVR? because pvr is tight tight lipped, you could stick a good chunk of coal in there mouth and have a diamond within a week...

Next.. Geforce 3, Hardware Pixel/Vertex Shaders.... proved tobe a good step for the graphics world.. bring us even closer to lifelike cimatic Real time rendering....

at the same time, ATI providing Truform and other technologies, Currently Truform doesn't appear to be used much at all, Although when it is used.. it has potential, Specially in older games give overall, extremeply improved graphics by adding in more polygons.... square heads? not anymore...

Ati later start providing the Catalyst Suiet Driver sets.... before having been plague with issues and constant driver problems.... the catalyst drive team started working hard on a extremely reliable driver.... giving ATI that "considerable" edge it needed to really start being a worthy player in the graphics arena..... *cheers*

Radeon 9700/9800 pro's... providing extremely FAST gaming at HIGH resolutions and massive amount of additional Quality settings.... AF and FSAA were now available nearly all the time without suffering from sub 30-60 fps.

Currently, I'm not completely convinced on the 3Dc (did i get it right? ) provided by ATI and nvidia's saposed "Pixel Shader 3.0" support that they are bosting.... (although it's strange how it doesn't appear to run anything that requires true PS3.0 support" *cough* AKA Cloth demo for example)

Ferret_Style · Aug 17, 2004, 02:17 AM

Personally i think it was the Radeon DDR . The original Radeo that started the entire catalyst drivers and such. I had that card for a very long time with great performace. Before that would have to be the voodoo5 5550 for the duel proccessor on card control. That card was smoking for the price and performance..... i still have it

Vampyromaniac · Aug 17, 2004, 03:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Judas

Why didn't this card get more notice....

Perhaps because it were a mid-end card released the same time as GeForce 3.
Also people would prob look at the specs, and see no TnL support,
and assume it's not worth looking at. Also, hard to be the 3rd wheel in this game.

So anyway, does your vote go to all those cards you mentioned?
Every major card ever made were the most significant? hehe

Dom · Aug 17, 2004, 06:59 AM

9700 Pro

Ev!L-aLphA · Aug 17, 2004, 07:43 AM

i thought voodoo3 was a awesome card for its time

mainman · Aug 17, 2004, 07:46 AM

Voodoo

~~HawK~~ · Aug 17, 2004, 10:27 AM

Voodoo sucked major, it was a blurry bug ridden dark affair, only good for quake

Quote:

at the nearly same time, PVR had introduced the PCX2, although a bit late for the pc market... it provided quite a good preformance.. however, had it's setback with capabilities and some cases.. preformance was also hindered....

Setbacks? oh jeah, half the price of a Voodoo, it had 32bit, a knife sharp 3d image,
ran quake in 50fps 800x600x32 on a 200mhz pentium, any one who'd seen Ultimate race on a pcx 2 know what i mean,
but needed its own OGL API, just like Voodoo did,
but PVR didn't get support from the game company's because voodoo was the Card to have...
Doesn't matter anymore now , 3DFX is rightfully gone
And PVR is pressed in a mobile phone corner

Mr Flibble · Aug 17, 2004, 10:38 AM

Has to be the TNT, for two reasons; it was the card that made Nvidia a real player in the mainstream market, it was this competition which later led to the end of 3dfx, it started here (tho it was only barely a match). This card showed what could be achieved with driver updates, remember the Det 2.08s ? Performance increases were massive, and I mean in the real world not those large percentiles the PR dept like to quote.

~~REGENERAT1ON~~ · Aug 17, 2004, 04:12 PM

i remember the first time i seen "3Dfx Interactive" logo when its enters Glide mode.. oh it feels so good! anyway my Voodoo Rush (3DFX+AT25) 6mb ownz!

Al_Vampyre · Aug 17, 2004, 04:29 PM

I voted Voodoo and 9700pro, although I must admit I thought the PowerVR card was a better card than the Voodoo and thats why I had one. If PowerVr had been an option I would have voted for that!

~~HawK~~ · Aug 17, 2004, 05:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Al_Vampyre

I voted Voodoo and 9700pro, although I must admit I thought the PowerVR card was a better card than the Voodoo and thats why I had one. If PowerVr had been an option I would have voted for that!

along with a Matrox Mystique/Millenium? nodoubt

Yes would have to, but as usual PVR is no option (pardon the pun)

Zardon · Aug 17, 2004, 05:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Al_Vampyre

I voted Voodoo and 9700pro, although I must admit I thought the PowerVR card was a better card than the Voodoo and thats why I had one. If PowerVr had been an option I would have voted for that!

Its kind of like the VHS/Betamax deal, betamax was technically superior and flopped. I think alot of the people knew that 3dfx were going to win and just bought the slightly inferior hardware knowing there would be better driver and game support. Thats certainly why I did it.

On the subject of powervr, have you guys looked recently at some of the dreamcast graphics? like soulcalibur? those cards were WAY ahead of their time IMO.

Dom · Aug 17, 2004, 05:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zardon

Its kind of like the VHS/Betamax deal, betamax was technically superior and flopped. I think alot of the people knew that 3dfx were going to win and just bought the slightly inferior hardware knowing there would be better driver and game support. Thats certainly why I did it.

On the subject of powervr, have you guys looked recently at some of the dreamcast graphics? like soulcalibur? those cards were WAY ahead of their time IMO.

You and your Betamax/Laser Disc examples...

Ferret_Style · Aug 17, 2004, 05:53 PM

hey i still own a beta ... the quality rocks and trust me is 3 x better than VHS ... get hard to find repair place for it though ... i have over 200 videos on it.

AS for the video cards i still think the voodoo 5 is being over looked as it was i think the frist video card with duel GPU's on it and requiring external power.

Lchevy79 · Aug 17, 2004, 06:56 PM

9700 pro

Zardon · Aug 17, 2004, 07:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dom

You and your Betamax/Laser Disc examples...

you and your following me around the forum posting stupid replies at everything I post ... go and try moderating some forums for a change.

lets get this thread back on track.

Asmoday · Aug 17, 2004, 07:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zardon

you and your following me around the forum posting stupid replies at everything I post ... go and try moderating some forums for a change.

lets get this thread back on track.

Ahahaha!!!

Wiredzero · Aug 18, 2004, 11:36 AM

First Jump = Monster VOODOO Acclerator. (you know, the one that was a separate card install that had to work with another videocard.)

2nd BIG jump = GeForce 2 "Prophet II" GTS. The card was the Power card of it's time.

3rd BIG jump = ATi Radeon 9700 Pro. Brought smoothness to games that was unmatched at the time of it's release.

IamLakota · Aug 20, 2004, 09:21 AM

Voodoo and Voodoo2,yeah those were the days,wish they were still around they would be the King.I still have my 2 Voodoo2's SLI'd in my first rig and old P1 150mhz,..lol,..Great OGL performance.

EcPercy · Aug 20, 2004, 11:50 PM

The choices you provided pretty accurately summarize the important technologies that got us to where we are today. I think that overall the 9700 Pro is the card that is most significant. Too bad they were way too expensive at the time, but I now own this cards successor at a fraction of what the 9700 Pro cost.

Aug 16, 2004, 08:26 PM	#1
Vampyromaniac confutatis maledictis Join Date: May 2002 Location: somewhere dark Posts: 5,974 Rep Power: 74 System Specs	What was the most significant gfx card of its time? Which desktop 3D graphics card would you say was the most significant of its time? You can choose more than one, and of course there's Other, since I just listed what popped into my mind. Just post your card and the reasons you think it was so major. . __________________ *Digitalis 3.3* Athlon 64 3000 // ASUS K8V SE Deluxe // 1024MB PC3200 (2-2-2-10 1T) ATI All-In-Wonder 9700 Pro // 20" Dell 2005FPW (DVI) M-Audio Revo 7.1 + Philips Acoustic Edge // Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 320/16 Western Digital WD3200KS + 120/8 Seagate 7200.7 NEC ND-3550A 16x DVD±RW + Lite-On 52x24x CD-RW Antec Sonata case // 480W Antec TruePower personal bests \|\| Aq'3: 46796 \| 3D'01: 20461 \| 3D'03: 6336 \| 3D'05: 2677 \| PC'04: 4605 \| PC'02: 7691,9092,1250

Aug 16, 2004, 08:45 PM	#2
RVachon Genuine Crazy Canuck Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: Hamilton, ON Canada Posts: 208 Rep Power: 0	I would think the Voodoo would be it since it was the first "official" 3D accelerator. 2nd would be the 9700 since it was the biggest jump in performance over any other at that time. __________________ AMD 64 3500+ Winnie \| MSI Neo4 Platinum \| 1 GB Corsair TwinX1024 PC3200 Dual Channel \| ATI RADEON x850XT \| 200 GB WD SATA150 8 MB Buffer 7200 RPM \| Win XP Pro SP2 \|\|

Aug 16, 2004, 08:50 PM	#3
No_Style Styleless Wonder Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: Ottawa, Ontario Posts: 6,034 Rep Power: 0	9700 PRO and 9500 PRO. These two cards catapulted ATI to what they are today The 9500 PRO's price/performance ratio was through the roof and it certainly rocked. __________________ "The Best Style Is No Style" Specifications Here

Aug 16, 2004, 09:11 PM	#4
TwistedMetal MC John-117 Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Phoenix, Arizona Posts: 728 Rep Power: 0	I voted for Voodoo, Voodoo 2, and 9700 Pro. The Voodoo Series was leading the market for a long time, Glide was really taking off, games were being made in Glide. Voodoo/2 also had good OpenGL performance. 9700 Pro was a huge seller and a power card for it's time. It can still hold it's own as of today, it's a solid card with great performance. I wasn't really big on ATI until the 9700 Pro came out, in reviews the it blew away any card that was thrown at it. That made he decide to get a 9700 Pro and I have liked ATI ever since. __________________ [color=red][/color]

Aug 16, 2004, 09:14 PM	#5
Chaos Number Nine Join Date: May 2002 Location: Nova Scotia Posts: 5,269 Rep Power: 165 System Specs	Radeon 9500 NP __________________

Aug 16, 2004, 09:19 PM	#6
Zardon DriverHeaven Founder Join Date: May 2002 Posts: 32,480 Rep Power: 177	close call. 9700 springs to mind as the first card to offer playable gaming with AA and AF, and then we had the Voodoo 2 in SLI mode which was groundbreaking but after much debate I had to go for the original Voodoo, I was around when the whole PowerVR v Voodoo was going on and the day I bought my first voodoo was a day ill never forget.

Aug 16, 2004, 09:23 PM	#7
Asmoday Demonic Join Date: May 2002 Location: In the cold, dark north... Posts: 5,198 Rep Power: 90 System Specs	I voted by mistake on the geforce ddr....because i thougt about the first geforce...the one after the tnt2 ultra, wasn't that the first gfx to support t&l? Oh...i also voted on the 9700... __________________ How You can help Hardwareheaven by using Digg

Aug 16, 2004, 09:24 PM	#8
MIG-31 HardwareHeaven News Mod Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Nottingham,UK Posts: 55,745 Rep Power: 444 System Specs	first pc i had with any significant power in the graphics derartment were a voodoo 3 8mb.then swiched to a geforce 2 64mb pci,due to the voodoo were an onboard chip with no seperate agp slot. __________________ Please Post Your News Submissions Here

Aug 16, 2004, 10:01 PM	#9
evergreen DriverHeaven Lover Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: West Virginia Posts: 148 Rep Power: 0	Definitely the original Voodoo!!! There was no 3D before the Voodoo. 9700 is definitely a banging card, but I have to mention the 8500 as my second choice. Compared to anything less than a 9700, it's still kickin' @ss - 2200 MTexels/s fill rate & 8.80 GB/s memory bandwidth...

Aug 16, 2004, 10:25 PM	#10
~~HawK~~ Banned Join Date: May 2002 Posts: 2,092 Rep Power: 0	PVR PCX2 was better then Voodoo period. PVR Kyro I & II first card that outsold the NV GF2MX in many (european) country's. Sadly in a strange move STMicro stopped making Kyro's chips for unknown reasons, wonder what chip they are baking now..

Aug 17, 2004, 06:59 AM	#14
Dom DriverHeaven Extreme Member Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 12,940 Rep Power: 0	9700 Pro

Aug 17, 2004, 07:43 AM	#15
Ev!L-aLphA \| n f e c t e D Join Date: Sep 2003 Location: California Posts: 4,111 Rep Power: 60	i thought voodoo3 was a awesome card for its time __________________ R.I.P 8/8/04 4/21/08

Aug 17, 2004, 07:46 AM	#16
mainman Mr. Nobody Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: OmniPresent Nightwatcher Posts: 5,961 Rep Power: 69	Voodoo __________________

Aug 17, 2004, 10:38 AM	#18
Mr Flibble DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Aug 2004 Posts: 8 Rep Power: 0	Has to be the TNT, for two reasons; it was the card that made Nvidia a real player in the mainstream market, it was this competition which later led to the end of 3dfx, it started here (tho it was only barely a match). This card showed what could be achieved with driver updates, remember the Det 2.08s ? Performance increases were massive, and I mean in the real world not those large percentiles the PR dept like to quote.

Aug 17, 2004, 04:12 PM	#19
~~REGENERAT1ON~~ NGO Crew Join Date: Jun 2004 Posts: 409 Rep Power: 0	i remember the first time i seen "3Dfx Interactive" logo when its enters Glide mode.. oh it feels so good! anyway my Voodoo Rush (3DFX+AT25) 6mb ownz!

Aug 17, 2004, 04:29 PM	#20
Al_Vampyre HardwareHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Scotland Posts: 1,532 Rep Power: 71 System Specs	I voted Voodoo and 9700pro, although I must admit I thought the PowerVR card was a better card than the Voodoo and thats why I had one. If PowerVr had been an option I would have voted for that! __________________ "Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad" - Brian O'Driscoll - Ireland Rugby Team 2009 Grand Slam winning Captain.

Aug 17, 2004, 06:56 PM	#25
Lchevy79 -=[DHzer0point Team]=- Join Date: Nov 2003 Posts: 725 Rep Power: 0	9700 pro __________________ msi K7N2 delta2-AMD 2800xp@2083-1gig of pc2700ram -ati x850xt 256mb -Audigy mp3+ - 1 80gig maxtor 8mb and 1 250gig 16mb maxtor -48x24x48 buslink burner-and a lite on 4x +/- dvd burner xp home samsung lcd (19") 930b monitor

Aug 18, 2004, 11:36 AM	#28
Wiredzero DriverHeaven Lover Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: The other side of the screen. Posts: 154 Rep Power: 0	First Jump = Monster VOODOO Acclerator. (you know, the one that was a separate card install that had to work with another videocard.) 2nd BIG jump = GeForce 2 "Prophet II" GTS. The card was the Power card of it's time. 3rd BIG jump = ATi Radeon 9700 Pro. Brought smoothness to games that was unmatched at the time of it's release. __________________

Aug 20, 2004, 09:21 AM	#29
IamLakota HardwareHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: Viriginia Posts: 552 Rep Power: 0	Voodoo and Voodoo2,yeah those were the days,wish they were still around they would be the King.I still have my 2 Voodoo2's SLI'd in my first rig and old P1 150mhz,..lol,..Great OGL performance. __________________ Harley Davidson: If You Have To Ask You Wouldn't Understand!!! System Specs: Mobo:Asus P6T Deluxe V2,intel i7 920,2x BFG GTX 250 oc in SLI,Corsair 6gigs tri channel pc12800CL8 2xWD Velociraptor's 2x74gig WD Raptor , X-Fi Fatal1ty Titainium,HANNS-G HG281HD 1080p 28" monitor,Coolermaster HAF/922,PC-PWR&Cooling Sliencer 750,CoolerMaster V8 HSF

Aug 20, 2004, 11:50 PM	#30
EcPercy HardwareHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Iraq Posts: 1,535 Rep Power: 64	The choices you provided pretty accurately summarize the important technologies that got us to where we are today. I think that overall the 9700 Pro is the card that is most significant. Too bad they were way too expensive at the time, but I now own this cards successor at a fraction of what the 9700 Pro cost.