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Mika1: Geforce 560 Ti (2011) - for new PC
Geforce 970 (2015) - upgrade for previous PC
Geforce 710 (2021) - bought in case 970 breaks since prices are what they are now
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pds41: I'm assuming you disposed of the 560 Ti? I reckon you would get better performance from that than a 710...
Still in storage, I assumed it didn't have a HDMI connection but I just checked and apparently it has a mini HDMI, so I guess I could buy an adapter cable for it if need arises.
Matronox Millennium. Diamond Stealth 3D, [None], Nvidia (2GB), AMD WX 3100.
Have to think way back. First descrete video card was a Savage S3 ????. Moved to several ATI cards, all of which died reasonably fast/or the card slot killed itself. . Current one is Nvida Geforce 1050ti. Usually get lower powered fanless cards (less moving parts less chance it will die....hopefully..)
Home computer growing up - probably barebones poop gpu, I think I played like HoMM 3 at one point.
Laptop during college - also poop integrated gpu, possibly Intel HD 4000 don't remember.
Laptop post college - somewhat better poop Intel HD 520, honestly wasn't too bad.
Gifted desktop - GTX 1050. It was free and works perfectly fine.

Integrated to dedicated is a huge step up, and has been the bottleneck of my 'setup'. Now I can basically play any game I want.
And my standards for graphics have been rock bottom for so long, any top of the line from around 2014 will probably look amazing to me. Also I have a huge back log of games that I couldn't play, so I rarely buy super new shit anyway.

e: I think the most graphic intensive game I manage to play on the Intel HD 520 was Grim Dawn at some low ass settings and low ass resolutions. Or Divinity Original Sin, on normal res, low graphics. Anecdotal, but shadows destroyed my Intel HD with any game
Post edited February 24, 2022 by pkk234
PCs that my family owned in the past didn't have dedicated graphics cards, as far as I know. The last one, which was purchased somewhere in the 2010s couldn't play most games later than the early 2000s. Some favorites during that long period included Fallout 2, Rise of Legends, and Warcraft 3.

My current and only PC with a dedicated GPU has a AMD Radeon 9 380, which I had for at least 5 years. Dragon Age: Origins, while normally playable at high settings, suffers from a memorly leak that gets progressively worse the longer you play. I had to switch to medium near the end. My most demanding game is probably Deus Ex: Mankind Divided; I believed it was no higher than medium setting.
Post edited February 24, 2022 by SpaceMadness
Fun Topic!

Let's see if I can remember the majority of them..,

Can't recall the card that came with my 286, but it was under a 1 MB of VRAM. The butterfiles in opening of Ultima VII moving like molasses was the main reason I upgraded from that one.

My next card was a 1 MB card, again no idea of the brand, but Ultima VII sure ran amazingly well. And you could have multiple windows open in Windows 3.1 without slowdown!

Next card I recall was a Powercolor ATI Rage. Gave decent 2D performance and mediocre 3D performance.

I "upgraded" to a Voodoo 5 5500 for the sole purpose of playing a highly discounted Ultima IX. Gave better 3D performance then the ATI Rage, but worse 2D. Still have that card actually.

Purchased a GeForce 4 Ti off a co worker who had won one. Fantastic card for the time, really enjoyed that one.

The Raedon HD 7870 was my go to GPU for my HTPC from 2012 to 2020, Pulled it's weight for many years. Even came with a free copy of Far Cry 3. Alas, eventually games like Dragon Quest XI were not able to run without slowdowns which is why I finally upgraded...

My current GPU is a RTX 2060 Super. Great card. I'll eventually want to upgrade it to a card that supports HDMI 2.1 though as I use my TV as my only screen and DVI isn't an option.
Hm, that's a good question.

I think the first I owned was a Nvidia 9800GT?
Then that burned within warranty so it was replaced with a Nvidia 450 GTS.
Then that burned out so it got replaced with a...Radeon 360 I think?

Then I completely upgraded my computer, as in tower and all so I use a RX 580 now. The 360 is still around but it's in storage. Probably still works.

Overall I had better luck with AMD cards, really. Pity they can't use Physx and Blender renders hate them though.
These are some great posts thanks for sharing :)
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Zimerius: ...
Monochrome? Damn, that's old-school :) I only once encountered monochrome gaming (possibly caveman olympics), but I did do my share of gaming on CGA. The old quest games especially has a certainly undeniable charm when in CGA.
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CMOT70: ...
3dFx Voodoo- not just any Voodoo but the original first version Orchid Righteous with the mechanical relays that make that clicking noise when the card kicks in. Still remember I was halfway through Descent 2 and this transformed the experience. The single largest step in graphics I witnessed in gaming. I still have this one, it still works. This one belongs in a museum.
....
I imagine few today will be able to comprehend how earth shattering this was to experience for the first time: blocky lowish FPS software mode, to delicious high fps gameplay with nary a blocky texture in sight.

For me that transition was with was with Tomb Raider 2 and Unreal.
Post edited February 24, 2022 by Matewis
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Randalator: ...
Diamond Viper V770 (nVidia Riva TNT 2)

...
I remember coveting that gpu based on how well it ran Giants and Urban Chaos. For some reason its name got etched into my memory.
Most of my PC upgrades can be linked to the releases of new Battlefield games.. hah. And there's a lot of Radeon in my list. I had a 128MB ATI AGP card when I was a kid too, but I can't remember what it was.. I had a Pentium 3 PC that I riced heavily with fan controllers and everything.

HD 7850 1GB - Bought this when I built my budget-oriented rig. I put it through hundreds of hours of Battlefield 3 at high settings and 1680x1050, and it never complained. I played through Witcher 3 on high settings and stable 30fps at launch too. Very capable card for the price. I'd probably use it for a few more years if I had bought the 2GB version.

RX 470 4GB - Bought this when Battlefield 1 came out, and it was mainly used for Battlefield, Tekken 7, Dragon's Dogma and Soulcalibur 6 when I owned it. I used it for about three years, then I sold it to my sister for cheap to help her out while building a PC.

RX Vega 56 8GB - I got this one very cheap at one of the crashes of the crypto market. It really was a great card in whatever I was playing, but sadly I didn't play a lot on PC at the time. I eventually sold it for more than twice of what I paid for it.

RX 570 4GB - Basically the same card as my old 470, I bought this one used to have something to play Battlefield and Rust on after I sold the Vega. It was pretty much as expected, as I had owned a 470 before. Still a capable card today though, I think. I sold it a few months ago, when a friend bought it for his son.

RX 6600 XT 8GB - I bought this a few months ago in anticipation for Battlefield 2042 (RIP). I didn't get a particularly good deal on it, but I opted for what I think was the only half-reasonable deal in the current GPU market. I bought it from some 18 year olds out of the trunk of a Model X full of GPUs. While I didn't find lasting entertainment in BF2042, I've put it through several new games, like F1 2021, Bright Memory Infinite, Dying Light 2, Halo Infinite and Call of Duty: Vanguard. The performance has been great at 1440p. I'll probably hold on to this for a while now.
Post edited February 24, 2022 by Random_Coffee
Kept meaning to post here and didn't get around to it during the just 2 days of activity of this thread, nor in the next few, but I guess I'll do it now, while it's still far from being a necro...

The first computer, in 1992, had a 512 kb video card that I recall being Trident. It could do 800x600x8bpp but monitor could only do 640x480 so that was the limit. As far as I recall, it was pretty much the only component that remained when the computer was otherwise upgraded in 1994 (386 SX 16 MHz w/ 2 MB RAM to 486 DX2 66 MHz w/ initially 4 MB RAM later upgraded to 8 MB). Because the monitor didn't allow more, can't say that the video card was ever a problem, the CPU and RAM being very limiting as time passed.
The computer bought in 1998 had a S3 Virge 4 MB. The moment when it obviously showed its limits was when I tried to play Arcanum and was getting some 2 fps (granted, 266 MHz CPU played a part as well), so had to wait until the next computer, which was the first I put together myself from parts, to play that. I believe I also played Monkey Island 4 on it and wasn't getting any coloring on characters, all were white ghosts, but the game otherwise worked all right.
In 2002, MSI GeForce 2 Ti 64 MB. Clearly the weakest component of that system, but for what I wanted to play, can't say it really limited me. Well, I had to play VtM: Bloodlines on near minimum settings and was still getting low fps, and in combat with particles and/or multiple enemies it'd almost crawl, but can't say I minded it too much, used to choppy performance. Oh, wait, sorry, it did make me postpone playing The Bard's Tale, started it on it but it barely crawled and gave up until the next computer. Did push through Civilization IV on it though, but that was mainly a CPU issue I guess, AI turns lasting 20 minutes, then played it again on the next computer.
The computer I put together in 2008 initially had a Leadtek GeForce 8400 256 MB (massive factory overclock) since I could afford no more at first, so just needed something to put an image on the screen (did for example play Final Fantasy 7 and 8 on it, or Perfect World International, though "enjoyed" is a different aspect), so that was the only computer I've had that I've upgraded the GPU for, the following year, to a EVGA GeForce GTS 250 1 GB. What it really struggled with, and I had to give up on the idea of playing as a result, was Witcher 2. Played the first Witcher on it, Risen, Tropico 3, Two Worlds, Drakensang, or King's Bounty: The Legend. Also Two Worlds 2 or Forsaken World, though those can't exactly be listed as "enjoyed".
And that's still put away, because this computer, bought in 2015, just has a Pentium G3440 (3.3 GHz dual-core)'s integrated graphics. As you can imagine, it severely limits what can be played on it, but having 4 GB of RAM and staying on 32-bit Win 7, since 64-bit would just lower performance, using more of that limited RAM for the same operations, may limit even more. But sticking to this 1280x1024 monitor bought in 2007 does help, far less graphical power required for that resolution than more "modern" ones, and that and the fact that I'm used to choppy performance means I could play games on it that may perhaps be quite baffling to many (Venetica, Ember, Tropico 4, Gone Home, Bound By Flame, even Lords of Xulima may count). And probably the one it struggled the most with was Gone Home, but that was because there was no need for smoothness there, so I upped the graphics quality until I was getting probably about 10 fps, and less at times. It does hit a hard limit, probably of RAM, if I really up the quality in Bound by Flame when I tried playing that, but on moderate settings that's just fine too.
Post edited March 09, 2022 by Cavalary
I don't remember the first ones, i wasn't into PCs and mainly used the old used one we had at home (with W95 and later XP) and my fathers laptops after that.
The first one i remember was the first PC i bought myself, it was a 560TI.
I used it until is actually built my first system with a 980 (not TI, it wasn't announced when i built it).
I also had a 5700XT (for my secondary system later on) and a 2060 Super which i got very cheap (around 100€ if i remember correctly) as a temporary solution.
Now I'm running a 3090 in my main system, the mentioned 5700XT in my secondary system and i have a Laptop with a 1660TI if that counts.
I remember there was a similar thread here quite many years ago and I also remember barely remembering what I had had up till then. Now memory is totally shot. There was some S3, Diamond, Hercules and Matrox in the nineties and that was fine as I only played 2D games then. The order I had them in? No clue any more. A shitty 3D capable GPU from Nvidia (from 2000 or 2001 or so) with like two cores allowed me to play the ugly Empire Earth, which could have been made in 2D and looked much better for it. Some Nvidia 5600? 5700? let me play 3D games for real, Call of Duty 2, Battlefield 2 (with lowered settings as the GPU did not support it 100%) Far Cry (a game that blew me away). This one I stuck with for several years until I bought a Radeon HD 4870, which sadly only came with 512MB of VRAM. Crysis on that was a pain until I lowered the setting to DX9. The rest is boring modern times. A GT 7800 replaced my broken GPU until I fixed it. An Nvidia 560Ti made a big difference in graphics capabilities and allowed me to get a bigger monitor (which I sadly still use). A top GPU from many years earlier was rebranded as a Radeon R9 280X. This allowed me to play X4:Foundations on lowest very well but did not allow me to raise any settings at all of those handful I tried. I guess the card was/is too old to support things. (I am willing to sell this one for cheap.)

The RX 580 I have now will hopefully last me until I can afford a reasonable raytracing capable GPU, maybe in 2025 or 2024 with luck but I am enjoying it well enough for now.
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Themken: Far Cry
Tried that on the GeForce 2 Ti, ran it in 640x480, but poked around the starting area for some minutes, then said screw that, no interest. Same with Half-Life 2 (about the lack of interest and giving up in minutes, but it ran at higher settings).
1992-1994: what is a GPU, something to eat...?

1994-1996: Diamond SpeedStar 1 MB

1997-2000: Guillemot Maxi Gamer 3dfx Voodoo 4MB

2000-2002: NVIDIA GeForce II Ultra 64 MB

2002-2022: various crap chips none of which worth mentioning (one AMD and several Intel, OK for classic gaming)