Unobtainium?

[RussianSensation]

No, you couldn't because the only difference between 9500pro and 9700pro was bus width you must have mistaken a regular 9500 with 9500 pro. A vanilla 9500 had 4 pipelines and 256 bit bus, it used the same chip as 9700pro so half the pipelines were disabled.
BTW. If I remember correctly there was a time when you could buy some version of 5900 for the price of 9600pro and it wasn't a bad deal at all. .

I am too lazy to dig up into much depth on 9500pro flashing but I think it was possible to get 9700 level of performance with the flash, even though it wouldn't be as fast as the actual 9700pro without overclocking:

http://gotoanswer.stanford.edu/benefits_of_flashing_9500_pro_to_9700_pro_-2283710/

http://www.techimo.com/forum/graphics-cards-displays/113087-ati-9500-pro-bios-flash-9700-pro.html

Other sites report you needed the $150-175 4 pipeline 9500 NP 128MB to turn into a $275-325 9700Pro:

http://www.digitaltrends.com/how-to/turn-your-radeon-9500-into-a-9700/

The main point is NV's 5000 series was getting killed in both the high and low end.

As far as 5900XT/Ultra costing as little as a 9600pro, I don't ever recall that in Canada or US. This is probably your market specific situation. Also, X1950XT was faster than any 7900 series so I am not sure about your last point. By the time shader intensive games started coming out, I remember vividly how much junk 7900 GTO/GTX series became. My primary buying choice narrowed down to the X1950XTX and 8800GTS. I went with the latter but 7900GTX/GTO wasn't even on the table because 8600GTS beat 7900GTX in COD:MW1; that's how bad it got for the GeForce 7.

If GeForce 5 was the worst of all NV generations, GF7 is a close 2nd. It also has inferior 2D and 3D IQ to ATI. By the end of 2011, 7900GTX's performance got so bad, X1800XT outperformed it and when you turned AA filters on, 7900GTX was a disaster!
http://www.computerbase.de/2011-10/bericht-grafikkarten-evolution/3/

The 2 generations to skip from NV were easily GF5 and 7. They plain sucked like 2900XT/3800 series from AMD.

 

[Lepton87]

I am too lazy to dig up into much depth on 9500pro flashing but I think it was possible to get 9700 level of performance with the flash, even though it wouldn't be as fast as the actual 9700pro without overclocking:

http://gotoanswer.stanford.edu/benefits_of_flashing_9500_pro_to_9700_pro_-2283710/

http://www.techimo.com/forum/graphics-cards-displays/113087-ati-9500-pro-bios-flash-9700-pro.html

Other sites report you needed the $150-175 4 pipeline 9500 NP 128MB to turn into a $275-325 9700Pro:

http://www.digitaltrends.com/how-to/turn-your-radeon-9500-into-a-9700/

The main point is NV's 5000 series was getting killed in both the high and low end.

As far as 5900XT/Ultra costing as little as a 9600pro, I don't ever recall that in Canada or US. This is probably your market specific situation. Also, X1950XT was faster than any 7900 series so I am not sure about your last point. By the time shader intensive games started coming out, I remember vividly how much junk 7900 GTO/GTX series became. My primary buying choice narrowed down to the X1950XTX and 8800GTS. I went with the latter but 7900GTX/GTO wasn't even on the table because 8600GTS beat 7900GTX in COD:MW1; that's how bad it got for the GeForce 7.

I had a 9500pro and flashing it didn't make sense as it was already a fully enabled card. It was clocked at 275/270 mine overclocked to 350/325 and at those clocks it should perform similarly to a 9700 but vanilla 9700 was clocked at 275/270 same as 9500pro while 9700pro was clocked at 325/325.
I paid for my 7900GTO 512MB over 35% less that I would have paid for X1900XT(of course back then 8800 series wasn't even on the horizon, also there were very few games where it performed very bad, by the time it was inadequate there were already G80 cards on the market) so it wasn't a bad value back then and by the time it performed like garbage I already had a 8800GTS 512. X1900XT was much better, especially later but it was also much more expensive especially compared to 7900GTO

 

[skipsneeky2]

This thread makes me miss my 6200le agp,it wasn't much but it was special cause it was my first gpu.Cost me $20.BF2 my first pc game played like a turd even at 800x600 low due to the craptastic P4. The 7800gs i ended up going for didn't fair much better,higher resolution but that was about it.

I did buy a retro system back in 2009 that was a a custom p4 gamer built around the fx 5500 i believe,so damn original and clean it still had the "fresh" partition of xp with just sp1 lol.The psu quit and took out the whole thing after being booted for about 30 mins.Was a serious barn yard find cause the interior was fresh and clean.I doubt the thing was even booted after being bought cause there was zero software or anything on it for that matter.

I beta Lava would have loved that system,it was pure fx era based,everything was mint and new looking,case had next to no scratches on it.It was a Frys pre-built.

 

[WT]

I still have my 5900XT, couldn't seeing buying the Ultra as it cost an arm and a leg back in the day. Only card I have ever owned that had a fan on the back side of the card.

http://duhvoodooman.com/5900xt/MSI_5900XT_1.jpg

edit:

7900gx2- not be confused with a 7950gx2

Wait, what .. ??!!?? They made a 7900gx2 ?? Wow, I thought I had seen it all !! I have a 7950gx2 still in service here. Got it from eVGA to replace a failing 7900GT KO card.

 

[NIGELG]

I owned three 9700s and one 9500pro during that time. I also bought a used X800XTPE (<--WTF). Great cards and great time for AMD, although Nvidia was rebounding back quickly with the 6xxx series which was very good.

They were not AMD cards...The company was ATi.

 

[smitbret]

I have never owned a 5800 Ultra but I did have a 5900 Ultra "Nbox" edition. I traded it for the Chaintech Gold edition Ti4200[/i] and Radeon 9600XT. I still have the Chaintech Ti4200.

Favorite card...... EVER!

 

[fchuber]

They aren't all in landfills. I just happen to know where a NIB BFG 5800 Ultra is . Had about 2 hours of use comparing to a 5950 ultra and put back away. My post count wont allow me to post pictures, but PM if interested.

 

[Keysplayr]

They were not AMD cards...The company was ATi.

What ev's.

 

[lavaheadache]

They aren't all in landfills. I just happen to know where a NIB BFG 5800 Ultra is . Had about 2 hours of use comparing to a 5950 ultra and put back away. My post count wont allow me to post pictures, but PM if interested.

pm'ed hesitantly

 

[fchuber]

It seems I can not even respond to your PM due to post count....sheesh. See my profile for email.

 

[Red Hawk]

If GeForce 5 was the worst of all NV generations, GF7 is a close 2nd. It also has inferior 2D and 3D IQ to ATI. By the end of 2011, 7900GTX's performance got so bad, X1800XT outperformed it and when you turned AA filters on, 7900GTX was a disaster!
http://www.computerbase.de/2011-10/bericht-grafikkarten-evolution/3/

The 2 generations to skip from NV were easily GF5 and 7. They plain sucked like 2900XT/3800 series from AMD.

Ah, but the AGP 7300 GT was the first discrete graphics card I ever had as a kid...needed it to play Knights of the Old Republic properly. So the 7000 series will always have a little special place in my heart. :wub:

 

[NIGELG]

What ev's.

An expected response from you.

Those cards you claim you owned were released by Ati....a totally different company from AMD in 2003 to 2005 when those cards were released.

AMD bought out Ati in 2006.

 

[NTMBK]

they aren't all in landfills. I just happen to know where a nib bfg 5800 ultra is . Had about 2 hours of use comparing to a 5950 ultra and put back away. My post count wont allow me to post pictures, but pm if interested.

it's a christmas miracle!

 

[therealnickdanger]

An expected response from you.

Those cards you claim you owned were released by Ati....a totally different company from AMD in 2003 to 2005 when those cards were released.

AMD bought out Ati in 2006.

Splitting hairs, don't you think? AMD closed the deal with ATI in late 2006 and none of ATI's GPU roadmaps changed until a couple years after that, and ATI GPUs didn't even change marketing to AMD until about 2011.

Pre-GCN = ATI
GCN+ = AMD

 

[SPBHM]

Splitting hairs, don't you think? AMD closed the deal with ATI in late 2006 and none of ATI's GPU roadmaps changed until a couple years after that, and ATI GPUs didn't even change marketing to AMD until about 2011.

Pre-GCN = ATI
GCN+ = AMD

I think they've changed the name in 2010, the HD 5000s were the last using the ATI brand!?


as for the 5800U, oh yes, I remember those days, all the jokes about the cooler and the low performance compared to the 9700... so yes, it's no surprise the card is very rare, and desirable for a collection...

the rest of the FX series I think enjoyed reasonable success, the 5200s, 5700s and 5900s...

I few years back I also thought about buying one, and searching on ebay I only found the non ultra model.

the Quadro card using the same GPU is probably easy to find.

 

[ChuckFx]

Out of pure curiosity, why do you want to play with that card so much? It is rated as the worst of the worst.. I understand the thrill to obtain the most powerful card but the worst? Please take no offense to the question, I'm just curious to know why!

 

[Cookie Monster]

If GeForce 5 was the worst of all NV generations, GF7 is a close 2nd. It also has inferior 2D and 3D IQ to ATI. By the end of 2011, 7900GTX's performance got so bad, X1800XT outperformed it and when you turned AA filters on, 7900GTX was a disaster!
http://www.computerbase.de/2011-10/bericht-grafikkarten-evolution/3/

The 2 generations to skip from NV were easily GF5 and 7. They plain sucked like 2900XT/3800 series from AMD.

I don't think GF7 was that bad. When the 7800GTX came out, it blew both the 6800Ultra/X850XT out of the water (like twice as fast in most cases). They were much quicker in launching their next gen product and when the X1800XTs launched you got 7800GTX 512 which was quicker given the games at that time. 7800GTs were also perfect upgrades given the cost (along with 7600GTs). Sure ATi had better IQ but given the price and what was available with the kind of games being played I don't think it was too bad..

Sure the performance dropped off pretty quick once newer pixel heavy games started to hit the scene and once again ATI products tend to fair better (or should I say more future proofed) but then we all know that G80 was right around the corner and when it hit the markets, it outperformed anything/everything.

I tend to think the GT200 would be a worth while candidate at 2nd place. The amount of hype (can of duds anyone?) vs only being 10% faster than the HD5870.

 

[lavaheadache]

Out of pure curiosity, why do you want to play with that card so much? It is rated as the worst of the worst.. I understand the thrill to obtain the most powerful card but the worst? Please take no offense to the question, I'm just curious to know why!

I want one because they represent a significant event in a hobby I enjoy. That card really gave ATi the upper hand for the time ever. Flawed Products are just as interesting as perfect products if not more so.

Anyhow, as of now it looks like this thread may have turned up a happy ending. I'll follow up with more details later if it pans out.

 

[lavaheadache]

I don't think GF7 was that bad. When the 7800GTX came out, it blew both the 6800Ultra/X850XT out of the water (like twice as fast in most cases). They were much quicker in launching their next gen product and when the X1800XTs launched you got 7800GTX 512 which was quicker given the games at that time. 7800GTs were also perfect upgrades given the cost (along with 7600GTs). Sure ATi had better IQ but given the price and what was available with the kind of games being played I don't think it was too bad..

Sure the performance dropped off pretty quick once newer pixel heavy games started to hit the scene and once again ATI products tend to fair better (or should I say more future proofed) but then we all know that G80 was right around the corner and when it hit the markets, it outperformed anything/everything.

I tend to think the GT200 would be a worth while candidate at 2nd place. The amount of hype (can of duds anyone?) vs only being 10% faster than the HD5870.

I actually disagree with Geforce 7 being a terrible series of cards. At the time of release they were by far the fastest chips out and remained competitive throughout their useful life. Russian linked to some graphs showing the cards in modern games a solid 5 years after release. Yes, the equivalent Radeons were miles ahead but we were still talking completely unplayable frame rates. Who cares? I don't.

2 years ago I was toying around with one of my 7800 GTX 512's vs. X1900XTX. I did find that in the one game I was testing, Batman AA, that the X1900XTX was still able to play the game enjoyably while 7800 GTX 512 left me desiring more. With that said, I agree that ATi had a much more future proof design but it doesn't matter much since many of us move on well before it becomes a consideration.

 

[Magic Carpet]

With that said, I agree that ATi had a much more future proof design but it doesn't matter much since many of us move on well before it becomes a consideration.

History repeats itself. Both 7970 and 290 were more advanced at the time of release. Yet, the 7970 3GB is still decent in the latest games, not so the 680 2GB. The 1-year+ old 290 competes neck and neck with the much more recent 970/980s. And people don't mind paying extra premium for the weaker design NV cards. Crazy world.

Glad, that you have finally found your Unicorn.

 

[Lepton87]

I don't think GF7 was that bad. When the 7800GTX came out, it blew both the 6800Ultra/X850XT out of the water (like twice as fast in most cases). They were much quicker in launching their next gen product and when the X1800XTs launched you got 7800GTX 512 which was quicker given the games at that time. 7800GTs were also perfect upgrades given the cost (along with 7600GTs). Sure ATi had better IQ but given the price and what was available with the kind of games being played I don't think it was too bad..

Sure the performance dropped off pretty quick once newer pixel heavy games started to hit the scene and once again ATI products tend to fair better (or should I say more future proofed) but then we all know that G80 was right around the corner and when it hit the markets, it outperformed anything/everything.

I tend to think the GT200 would be a worth while candidate at 2nd place. The amount of hype (can of duds anyone?) vs only being 10% faster than the HD5870.

You are mistaken, the 7800GTX was only 50-60% faster than the 6800U and 40-50% than the X850XT. Nowhere near twice as fast, maybe you were thinking about the 7800GTX 512 which almost doubled the improvement in speed over a regular 7800GTX. There was a massive clock difference 550MHz/1700 vs 430MHz/1200. Alas 7800GTX 512 was in very limited supply but it was indeed about twice as fast as its predecessors (6800U/X850XT)

 

[therealnickdanger]

I think they've changed the name in 2010, the HD 5000s were the last using the ATI brand!?

Yes, I suppose if we're going to get specific, calendar late October 2010 is when the entry-level AMD-branded 6000 series came out. The 6000-series still used the VLIW architecture of previous HD SKUs. The first major architectural change after the merger was RISC-based Graphics Core Next of the 7000-series introduced in late 2011/early 2012.

HD6000 was essentially the end of ATI's roadmap, HD7000 was the beginning of AMD's. That's how I interpret it anyway. ;-)

 

[Subyman]

Enjoyed reading the thread. Hopefully fchuber pulls through. I wish I would have kept all my voodoo cards, they look like they trade for some decent money these days.

 

[lavaheadache]

Enjoyed reading the thread. Hopefully fchuber pulls through. I wish I would have kept all my voodoo cards, they look like they trade for some decent money these days.

:thumbsup:

 

[Magic Carpet]

As far as the prototype cards are concerned, I find them to be cool but I have a limit on how much I'm willing to spend on this stuff. Buying a working voodoo 6000 would be cool but I'd rather waste that kind of money on my main rig or my 911.

Then, you are not hardcore enough. Keep looking, never you know when you meet "the right one".

There is a Gainward Bliss 7800 gs on ebay right now but it is way out of my price range for such a card. It would cost about $150. No thanks

I had one Bliss... in my retro AGP box, had served me well until I killed it. Likely due to the negligence on my part when I was installing custom cooling. Sad loss indeed. I agree $150 is a bit too steep, but there are plenty of them in Europe. Just keep looking, better deals pop up quite regularly.

EDIT: Would be fun, if you could bench that 5800U in a modern rig, using 3dmark or something.