Video Card History

John Mathers writes "While searching the net for information on old Voodoo Video Cards, I came across this fabulous Video Card History article up at FastSilicon.com. It's nice to see that someone has taken the time to look back on the Video Cards that revolutionized the personal computer. Here's a quote "When 3dfx released their first card in October of 1996, it hit the computer world like a right cross to the face. That card was called Voodoo. This new card held the door open for video game development. The Voodoo card was simply a 3D graphics accelerator, which was plugged into a regular 2D video card; known as piggy backing."

Nostalgia

[CrayHill]

Aahh, 1996...the good old days...

I remember when we would write ASCII graphics contouring programs for line printers!

FastSilicon.com

[loconet]

FastSilicon.com - not so fast anymore.

Lost $50 on that Voodoo II

[WC as Kato]

I remember when I was craving for a Voodoo card so that I could run Quake better. I finally sprung for a Voodoo II card when they had a $50 rebate. I was so excited to get online with my ISDN line and frag everyone in OpenGL graphics that I threw away my Voodoo II box along with its product bar code. No proof of purchase no $50 rebate. Doh! Damn, that hurt my wallet.

Blurb from article

[Acidic_Diarrhea]

From the article: "The cards released then were rather nuke warm. Nothing really special, nothing too different brought to the table..."

Nuke warm cards huh? How many fans do you need for one of those?

The Internet needs an editor or two hanging around.

Slashdotted

[kinnell]

Maybe they should change their name from fastsilicon to smokingsilicon.

The Monster3D memories

[Obiwan Kenobi]

I had a 3dfx Monster3d (Voodoo 1) back in Winter 1996, when it first came out. I remember the passthru cable that connected to my turbocharged 2MB video card and my overclocked P150 (to a P166, yeah baby!), and I certainly recall the brilliance of GL Quake and the absolutely gorgeous Grand Theft Auto (1!) after it supported Glide.

I also recall the controversy of transparent water in Quake and how that was considered "cheating" by en large. Those poor non-accelerated folks had to get in the water first to see anything!

Me, I'd just wait until they all jumped in the water and fire off that Lightning Gun. Sure it's suicide, but is it really suicide when you get to roast at least 5 or more people at the same time? DM3, how I miss thee.

Re:Nostalgia

[AllenChristopher]

His point is that fondly looking back on graphics cards in '96 is like anxiously checking Rolling Stone every issue to find out if 90's music is retro yet. Computers without monitors... now that's history.

Re:Revisionist History?

[rsmith-mac]

Agreed. You can't have a serious history piece without also including S3(and the world's first 3D decelerator) and Rendition. The article pooped out before I got to page 3, but I'm willing to bet they've also managed to skip the Intel i740, another decent but notable product.

Matrox

[mr.henry]

If you trying to decide between an ATI and an Nvidia, don't forget Matrox! Both ATI and Nvidia have been busted for pumping frame rates, but not Matrox! Sure, you may only get 15-20 fps, but at least you know your Matrox got them honestly. They will look really beautiful too.

Re: 12mg

[turgid]

You had a 12 milligram graphics card?

Only 1996 to the Present-"average" recollection.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Try getting the specs to a PCI card nowadays..."

Try finding someone who understands them.

Re:Ah... those were the days :-)

[CaseyB]

lowly CGA (which looked terrible, by the way)

What are you talking about? On CGA, you had complete choice! You could use either the rasta red/green/yellow palette, or the nuclear pink/cyan/white palette! What more do you want?