sliderider wrote:

As for vintage cards, uniqueness is what gets me. A card that does something in a way nobody else does like PowerVR or Rendition. A card that never sold well originally and rarely turns up for sale also manages to lure me in once in a while, even if it has a reputation for being a "bad" card, the rarity factor alone is sometimes enough to get me to hit the Buy It Now button.

Very true. It's actually the only reason I even bothered getting the Kyro II and why I dished out for a V4 and a V5 (even though I didn't actually plan on using them, for me Voodoo 3 3000/3500 is all I'll actually need).
Part of the cards I collect is because I think they are practical to have and another part is to have some obscure hardware I may want to build a rig around...someday! 😜

It's with all hardware actually.
For example, I've gotten a couple Coppermine 1000's, but the ones with IHS (=Integrated HeatSpreader 😉 ) because they are very fast and I can stick large Aluminium heatsinks on them without the troubles caused by the tiny die. But otoh I also got a couple VIA C3's, not because their performance is so great (because I reckon their performance is actually closer to that of the K6 mobiles then to any s370 CPU from Intel!), but because they are uncommon and are receiving very little retro love 😜

I'm unfamiliar with any NV card past the GF7600GS DDR2 AGP's so I can't really comment on them.
Once I start building those couple extra lan/spare rigs I'll see what comparable graphics cards I have available for them and simply use those...but first I still got LOTS of hardware waiting for me to clean, test and sort, including resorting most of the storage area in my attic. Otherwise I'll drown up there L O L!

And another reason I tend to stay away from NVidia is because the GF7 and later cards either have issues with the die substrate fiasco, or because they are so recent that they are still too expensive for my tastes.

sliderider wrote:

High end cards aren't necessarily hugely impactful on gaming. Yes, they allow you to run games with all the options on High or Ultra, but only the wealthiest gamers can even afford to shop the high end, so their overall impact is limited. It's the mainstream cards that sell in large numbers and manage to do things that nobody thought was possible in a card in their price range that usually leave the biggest impression which was why I mentioned the GTX460 over the GTX480. The GTX460 (and HD6870 on the AMD side) can run most games at decent framerates with enough options cranked up to look good, especially the overclocked versions. That's one of the things that makes a card collectible to me. As for vintage cards, uniqueness is what gets me. A card that does something in a way nobody else does like PowerVR or Rendition. A card that never sold well originally and rarely turns up for sale also manages to lure me in once in a while, even if it has a reputation for being a "bad" card, the rarity factor alone is sometimes enough to get me to hit the Buy It Now button.

Hey I get you there man. My main rig ATM is also running a GTX460 @880mhz/1760/2100 and runs anything I throw at it at max details, AA +AF 1680x1050 no probs. And my previous new cards were always the mid-end, e.g. 6600GT, 8800GT, GTS250, etc.

Same with my mobos and cpus, always the mid-end. I've been bridging the gap somewhat between my low/ mid-end stuff and the high-end by overclocking everything.

However now, I really have an appreciation for the high-end hardware- may not give you 100% more FPS, but they sure feel nice to own and great to look at.
😁

the superpi performance of viac3 is awesome! 🤣

noshutdown wrote:

the superpi performance of viac3 is awesome! 🤣

Yup, gotta admit, the VIA C3 is pretty "cool", hehe 😜

I don't like any graphics card with a fan. Maybe by now some are OK and silent, but I don't care enough.

No one thinks the TNT and TNT2 are worth collecting? They where the cards that started the real threat to 3Dfx! I'm still wanting a Hercules Dynamite TNT2 with the 175MHz clock. Also want to replace my damaged Diamond Viper 550 🙁

Voodoo 1 6MB would be highly collectible and rare
Voodoo 2 12MB just to round out any system
Voodoo 5 6000/rampage good luck finding one!
Geforce 4 Ti 4600

Oh yeah, I'm a 3Dfx/nVidia fanboy if anyone doesn't know 😀

I think TNT2 is definitely worth collecting (after all, it is kinda the GeForce 0 😜), but I already have enough TNT's and TNT2's and GF2MX is much more practical then TNT2 imo.

TNT1 isn't really practical btw. I owned one when it was new and it never impressed me, even though it was supposed to be the fastest graphics card on the world 😜

Come to think of it, the TNT2 is worth collecting and so is the GF2MX. The Voodoo 5 6000 is of course highly collectible, more so than any other card for many people, but it's price and rarity is another matter altogether.

If we're talking about mid-range cards then the Radeon 9600 Pro/ XT is hard to beat, a HL2 capable card that got most people into DX9. The Radeon 2600 DDR4 is also a very nice card, with a large red dual slot cooler that looks really nice and stylish- perfect for those windowed cases.

Tetrium wrote:

I think TNT2 is definitely worth collecting (after all, it is kinda the GeForce 0 😜), but I already have enough TNT's and TNT2's and GF2MX is much more practical then TNT2 imo.

TNT1 isn't really practical btw. I owned one when it was new and it never impressed me, even though it was supposed to be the fastest graphics card on the world 😜

It all depends. The TNT2 was fine, but you needed a crap ton of CPU horsepower behind it to get it to behave like a Geforce 256 or a GF2 MX would.

The TNT2 (even the anemic M64 variant) could do a lot in the right set up. Back when my buddy got his 1.4ghz Willamette P4 based Dell, I had a 600EB coppermine with a Geforce 256 SDR. His box got the same FPS in UT 99 as mine did despite his TNT2 M64 since his CPU had more grunt behind it. That changed 6-8 months later when I got my 1.4Ghz Willamette and dropped my 256 in it though 😁.

Unreal Engine is a CPU hog and that's what you saw there. Also, if you use D3D with it it becomes even more inefficient because it is designed around Glide.

This is also why UE1 games are so low poly. The engine scales poorly with more complex geometry. UE2 remedied this.

sgt76 wrote:

Come to think of it, the TNT2 is worth collecting and so is the GF2MX. The Voodoo 5 6000 is of course highly collectible, more so than any other card for many people, but it's price and rarity is another matter altogether.

If we're talking about mid-range cards then the Radeon 9600 Pro/ XT is hard to beat, a HL2 capable card that got most people into DX9. The Radeon 2600 DDR4 is also a very nice card, with a large red dual slot cooler that looks really nice and stylish- perfect for those windowed cases.

The 9600 was good only in terms of power consumption and being able to run fanless. The original 9500 cards were actually faster and some could unlock to a 9700. I'd rather have a card with a fan that runs faster and can be overclocked more than a fanless, lower performing card that you can't overclock much without adding better cooling.

You mean like my fanless GeForce 8800 GT? 😁
(also have a fanless GF3, GF 5900 Ultra and X850 XT around)

Granted, these are of my creation.

Actually, I prefer a fanless card that runs slower then a vacuum cleaner that runs faster hehe 😁

But then again, I'm not really into playing edge-of-the-line modern high end games anymore. Nowdays I play mostly older games, so any basic midrange card should suffice.

But I will admit, the high end cards are indeed VERY powerful!!

swaaye wrote:

You mean like my fanless GeForce 8800 GT? 😁

As long as it's not like my *cough* fanless GF7600GS's, both with very large passive heatsinks that still couldn't keep the buggers from overheating and locking up the system. Had to screw a casefan onto the large heatsink. At least they are still quite quiet with the 8cm fans running at 7v I think 😀

Well it's not small. It has a Arctic Cooling Accelero S1 attached. I've used those to cool the 8800GT and a Radeon 3870 as well. They are very wide but not taller than the stock cooler (ie 2 slots).

No stability problems but you could overwhelm a Accelero S1 if you went hotter than a 8800GT.

I prize quietness and will do just about anything to achieve it.

swaaye wrote:

Unreal Engine is a CPU hog and that's what you saw there. Also, if you use D3D with it it becomes even more inefficient because it is designed around Glide.

This is also why UE1 games are so low poly. The engine scales poorly with more complex geometry. UE2 remedied this.

Yeah, it's probably a bad metric in that regard come to think of it. The fact that a V3 or a pair of V2's in SLI could make it look better than a higher end D3D card is probably a dead give away.

swaaye wrote:

Well it's not small. It has a Arctic Cooling Accelero S1 attached. I've used those to cool the 8800GT and a Radeon 3870 as well. They are very wide but not taller than the stock cooler (ie 2 slots).

No stability problems but you could overwhelm a Accelero S1 if you went hotter than a 8800GT.

I prize quietness and will do just about anything to achieve it.

How loud is the fan on a 9500, though? Not very. And what happens to all the heat from your 8800GT with passive cooling? It gets radiated into the case where you need a more powerful case fan to vent it so you basically defeat the purpose of going with passive cooling and that massive heatpipe takes up a lot of space so you end up sacrificing a slot for it. Passive cooling also limits how much you can overclock the card before the heat becomes too much for a heatpipe alone. You would be much better with an 8800GT with a single slot cooler.

Accelero S1 works superbly with only minimal case airflow and it is extremely popular as a cheap but high performance passive solution and has been for years now. Go read about it. It is my favorite cooler for cards that don't put off too much heat for it. If you have to add fans because the card is too hot then it gets huge. 8800gt isn't that hot but you couldn't do a 8800gtx or Radeon 6950 say.

No I would not replace a Radeon 9500's cooler. However, I have used the old Arctic Cooling ATI Silencer on a 9700 but it was pointless really for both noise and extra cooling. The fan bearings on those inevitably wear out too.

I have used quite a few different aftermarket coolers for video cards. All in the name of silence 😁. Most recently I set up a noisy 6950 with a Thermalright Trad2 GTX and a modified base plate for VRM cooling. 7 volted the fans. Dead silent baby.

Btw the 8800gt single slot coolers scream in games. That's what came on this particular 8800gt. It actually would overheat. Was very iffy and annoying.

My 8800GT and GTS250 are ASUS models with a dual slot cooler stock from the factory- 80mm fan, very silent and cool. As long as I don't have a small high pitched fan in my case I'm cool. Don't dare go fanless- especially around here where ambient temps are over 30c sometimes.

Yah the dual slot coolers can be ok but some of them have a tendency to change speed rapidly and frequently in games which is annoying to me. I've become ridiculously picky 🤣. I like to replace these coolers with aftermarket designs that are adequate with a static and slow fan speed. It's part of the fun for me really.

The single slot 8800gt that I got from my bro would get so hot that it would artifact and this was with the fan sounding like a mosquito. It would break 100C easily. Underspecced cooling there. This is a early GT that had the original stock NV cooler.

ASUS 8800GTs have the best stock coolers. MIne never went over 65c even overclocked. And the GTS250 is even cooler- idles at 40+, load at 50 something...