Rare GPUs / Unreleased GPUs

[Ashley98]

Hey guys , on eBay a while back and bought it I found some sort of FX 5600 Ultra ES? Not sure. Here's pics

 

[LTUGamer]

I am enthusiast of rare, strange unusual and strange stuff. That is why I have decided to make list of popular brands which you know really good, but not as graphics cards manufacturers.

Creative

Creative is well known as headphones, sounds cards and speakers manufacturer. However they made graphics cards too. Since their cards are branded as Sound Blaster, they named their graphics cards as 3D Blaster. There are many classical models, including legendary Voodoo.

Crucial

Everybody knows Crucial memory products, but many years ago they tried to enter graphics cards market. There was some ATI Radeon 9000 card realised.

Rosewill

Rosewill is popular Newegg's in house brand for budget and mid tier computer cases, power supplies, Coolers, keyboards etc. However many years before they have offered graphics cards too. The latest found entry is GeForce 6600 GT

Zalman

Zalman put their big coolers on HIS Radeon and PC Partner GeForce cards and sold as their own cards. They began with AMD HD 6000 series and finished with GTX 700 series

Excluded from this list:

- OEM cards. Computer vendors such as HP, Dell, Acer, etc have many of them. Sometimes it appears retail, however it is not very interesting stuff.
- Corsair sold GTX 1080 (Ti) with their own liquid cooler. However, the card itself was branded as MSI. I know that similar situation as it was with Zalman, but Corsair even didn't tried to sell these cards as made by Corsair and even left MSI sticker. Also it is not very old, so most of enthusiasts still remember it.
- Canyon is quite popular brand (only in EMEA), orientated into cheap peripherals such as keyboards, mouses, etc. There was Radeon 9000 series graphics cards by Canyon, but I can't neither confirm that is the same company,
- Really old stuff which was before 3D era.

It you know something what I have missed, you can feel free to add.

 

[Cryogenta]

Hey guys!
I've recently come across this thread and thought I can show off something I've had for a while now. It's an old GTX 570 that I suspect might be some sort of ES/QS. Retail drivers work fine but the fan speed was set to something ridiculous like 2500RPM on idle in the BIOS which i later adjusted. The card was my daily driver for quite some time before being retired and it performed like a standard GTX 570 HD

The GPU-Z and die shot was taken back when I obtained the card.

 

[middle_twix]

View attachment 204226

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Yo are you going to play with this card or just collecting it? Im super curious, I had a S9300x2 retail I tried to do a lot of bios work on but it *seemed* 3d was disabled and I was only able to boot linux and run stuff through ROCm

I have 2 MI25s I was able to get display out on but these Fiji based server cards are a lot harder to get to work based on what I've read and the one card i've had. I think I got lucky with the MI25s because theres a Radeon Pro card that uses the exact same PCB while I cant find a board that uses the S9300x2 PCB. Almost 100% certain the Radeon Pro Duo Fiji is not this PCB.

 

[Cryogenta]

Yo are you going to play with this card or just collecting it? Im super curious, I had a S9300x2 retail I tried to do a lot of bios work on but it *seemed* 3d was disabled and I was only able to boot linux and run stuff through ROCm

I have 2 MI25s I was able to get display out on but these Fiji based server cards are a lot harder to get to work based on what I've read and the one card i've had. I think I got lucky with the MI25s because theres a Radeon Pro card that uses the exact same PCB while I cant find a board that uses the S9300x2 PCB. Almost 100% certain the Radeon Pro Duo Fiji is not this PCB.

It was my daily driver for a few years, a few years ago. Now it just sits in my collection

 

[Darthgrey]

Some old BFG GeForce FX, 5950 Ultra from Area-51 Extreme PC with stock GPU clock 510MHz:

 

[erek]

Some old BFG GeForce FX, 5950 Ultra from Area-51 Extreme PC with stock GPU clock 510MHz:

View attachment 206840

Hmm, I used to have a BFG Asylum 5800 Ultra with a Box just like that with a knick out of it just like that!

Wonder if it's the same one? :Hmm:

@Darthgrey

 

[Darthgrey]

I assume box is the same, but card I bought separately on ebay in December 2020. BTW some more FX: long FX5900 non Ultra 256 Mb and Quadro FX3000 ES with E-tag and with backplate like 5900 Ultra had.

 

[Darthgrey]

Some dual GeForce 6600GT's:

Both are in good working condition and both a faster than a single GeForce 6800 Ultra, I made some tests for myself:

I was using DFI Lanparty UT NF4 SLI motherboard with AMD Athlon FX-60 no OC.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Some dual GeForce 6600GT's:

View attachment 207686

Both are in good working condition and both a faster than a single GeForce 6800 Ultra, I made some tests for myself:

View attachment 207687

View attachment 207688

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I was using DFI Lanparty UT NF4 SLI motherboard with AMD Athlon FX-60 no OC.

This is more or less what the findings were BITD when these cards were new. The general idea was that if you could only afford a 6600GT, go for it and get another later for an increase in performance. But if you could afford it it was generally better to get the 6800. Of course some people would get the 6800 and then another later for even more performance...

IF NVidia were smarter than they are now, they would find a way to implement multi GPU usage completely driver and card dependant(it shouldn't be too difficult), meaning that software/game devs wouldn't need to code for it as all software would run as natively on an multi-GPU setup as it would on a single GPU because the software would be unaware of how many GPU's were present.

 

[Darthgrey]

And here is my small collection of Leadtek Winfast videocards, since the very beginning they offered many interesting cards with non reference cooling systems, before Geforce 7000 series it was very easy to recognise their products on the market shelf) So what we have here:

1. Leadtek Winfast Geforce 256 DDR
2. Leadtek Winfast Geforce 2 Ultra
3. Leadtek Winfast Geforce Ti500
4. Leadtek Winfast A250 Ultra GeForce Ti4600
5. Leadtek Winfast A280 Geforce Ti4800SE
6. Leadtek Winfast A300 Ultra GeForce FX5800 Ultra - I assume it's the only one 5800 Ultra which has no issues with reballing GPU and memory)
7. Leadtek Winfast A350 LX GeForce FX5900
8. Leadtek Winfast A350 Ultra GeForce FX5900 Ultra
9. Leadtek Winfast A380 Ultra GeForce FX5950 Ultra
10. Leadtek Winfast PX6600GT TDH Dual Geforce 6600GT
11. Leadtek Winfast A400 Ultra Geforce 6800 Ultra
12. Leadtek Winfast A7800GS TDH Geforce 7800GS
13. Leadtek Winfast Geforce 8800 Ultra Leviathan - fastest 8800 Ultra ever made.

All are well maintained and in good working condition.

 

[lexluthermiester]

And here is my small collection of Leadtek Winfast videocards, since the very beginning they offered many interesting cards with non reference cooling systems, before Geforce 7000 series it was very easy to recognise their products on the market shelf) So what we have here:

1. Leadtek Winfast Geforce 256 DDR
2. Leadtek Winfast Geforce 2 Ultra
3. Leadtek Winfast Geforce Ti500
4. Leadtek Winfast A250 Ultra GeForce Ti4600
5. Leadtek Winfast A280 Geforce Ti4800SE
6. Leadtek Winfast A300 Ultra GeForce FX5800 Ultra - I assume it's the only one 5800 Ultra which has no issues with reballing GPU and memory)
7. Leadtek Winfast A350 LX GeForce FX5900
8. Leadtek Winfast A350 Ultra GeForce FX5900 Ultra
9. Leadtek Winfast A380 Ultra GeForce FX5950 Ultra
10. Leadtek Winfast PX6600GT TDH Dual Geforce 6600GT
11. Leadtek Winfast A400 Ultra Geforce 6800 Ultra
12. Leadtek Winfast A7800GS TDH Geforce 7800GS
13. Leadtek Winfast Geforce 8800 Ultra Leviathan - fastest 8800 Ultra ever made.

View attachment 207827

All are well maintained and in good working condition.

View attachment 207828

Are we fans of WinFast here?

Nice collection! Especially that liquid cooled 8800ultra!

 

[The red spirit]

Are we fans of WinFast here?

The brand that consistently made the most hideous coolers.

 

[Darthgrey]

The brand that consistently made the most hideous coolers.

Well, they look strange, I agree, but all those videocards are around 20 years old and they still work good, even this 8800 Ultra beast with AIO water cooler works fine and pump still not dead. It means that cooling system did it's best and let all those videocards work after so many years!

 

[lexluthermiester]

The brand that consistently made the most hideous coolers.

Not always, some were cool looking. They have to be given credit for experimenting. And their build quality was top notch.

 

[The red spirit]

Well, they look strange, I agree, but all those videocards are around 20 years old and they still work good, even this 8800 Ultra beast with AIO water cooler works fine and pump still not dead. It means that cooling system did it's best and let all those videocards work after so many years!

Those designs aren't really great for airflow. Particularly those dual fan designs with silver shrouds. The best cooler design is on GeForce 2 Ultra. It's not much of an achievement for graphics cards to work a long time. They are decently reliable, unless poorly engineered. The AIO one is surprising, that thing certainly shouldn't work so well and there should be some gunk inside.

Not always, some were cool looking. They have to be given credit for experimenting. And their build quality was top notch.

And now I'm curious which brand has made the most hideous cooler. I'm pretty sure that those WinFast cards with silver shrouds would be up there.

 

[lexluthermiester]

And now I'm curious which brand has made the most hideous cooler. I'm pretty sure that those WinFast cards with silver shrouds would be up there.

Look up some of the offerings from EVGA, ASUS and MSI from back then... WinFast was not alone in the "obnoxious & hideous" heatsink/fan design arena..

 

[The red spirit]

Look up some of the offerings from EVGA, ASUS and MSI from back then... WinFast was not alone in the "obnoxious & hideous" heatsink/fan design arena..

I just looked at some 8800 GTS, 7900 GTX and X1950 cards, they all look reasonable.

 

[lexluthermiester]

I just looked at some 8800 GTS, 7900 GTX and X1950 cards, they all look reasonable.

Oh, keep digging... Look for 9600GT and Geforce 3&4...

 

[The red spirit]

Oh, keep digging... Look for 9600GT and Geforce 3&4...

I found something:

The first card is old MSI 7600 GT. I wouldn't say that it's outright ugly, but it surely is a bit tasteless. The second card is just very unpleasant, OEM unknown.

Meanwhile 9600 GT was quite sad indeed:

Anyway, I still think that LeadTek was one of the worst, along with XFX, Point of View, Sapphire, PowerColor, HIS, Manli.

This card is just utter late 00s trainwreck:

But then, if I'm honest, some cards todays are as ugly as some LeadTeks.

 

[lexluthermiester]

I found something:

The first card is old MSI 7600 GT. I wouldn't say that it's outright ugly, but it surely is a bit tasteless. The second card is just very unpleasant, OEM unknown.

Meanwhile 9600 GT was quite sad indeed:

Anyway, I still think that LeadTek was one of the worst, along with XFX, Point of View, Sapphire, PowerColor, HIS, Manli.

This card is just utter late 00s trainwreck:

But then, if I'm honest, some cards todays are as ugly as some LeadTeks.

Yup, I knew you'd find some of them!

 

[Zyll Goliat]

Question guys...How "rare" and how good as investment are ATI 3870 X2 and Matrox Parhelia?

 

[OtterSpace]

To me Albatron takes the cake for "obnoxious & hideous" heatsink/fan design with their wise 2+1 backup fans in case one of them failed.

Basically all the FX series was a crazy mess of different colors and throwing out random designs to see what worked as TDP continued to rise. I love it.

"Question guys...How "rare" and how good as investment are ATI 3870 X2 and Matrox Parhelia?"

The 3870 and 3870x2 are at the perfect age for low value and high volume availability before availability will likely fall in 2+ years. You can get them super cheap if you wait around for a deal. If you pick one up look up past sales and wait around for one to pop up cheap and you will basically have no risk. However I dont see it getting crazy expensive except for maybe the non reference designs.

 

[The red spirit]

Yup, I knew you'd find some of them!

True, but today cards are in second wave of ugliness. Right now we have race to the bottom in terms of how hideous big heatsinks with RGB could be. Some bad examples of RTX 3080 cards:
Emtek Turbo Jet/Palit Gamerock/and other brands with same cooler
eVGA FTW3
Gainward Blue Star (This doesn't even have RGB, but it's hideous)
Gainward Phantom
Gainward Red Star
Galax EX-Gamer Pink
Galax Gamer
Gigabyte Aorus Master
Gigabyte Vision OC
Inno3D iChill Frostbite
Inno3D iChill X3
Inno3D iChill X4
Palit Gaming Pro
PNY XLR8 Uprising Epic-X
Zotac Apocalypse

I'm pretty sure that were now at the ugliest cooler era. Not even some late 00s or early 10s monstrosities can top that.

To me Albatron takes the cake for "obnoxious & hideous" heatsink/fan design with their wise 2+1 backup fans in case one of them failed.

That's spectacularly hideous

Basically all the FX series was a crazy mess of different colors and throwing out random designs to see what worked as TDP continued to rise. I love it.

I quite liked that era, but then again I think that basic 6800 Ultra was hideous:

It just feels too industrial and is on ugly green PCB with barf inducing sticker. ATi X800 XT PE from same era looked a lot better:

 

[Zyll Goliat]

To me Albatron takes the cake for "obnoxious & hideous" heatsink/fan design with their wise 2+1 backup fans in case one of them failed.

Basically all the FX series was a crazy mess of different colors and throwing out random designs to see what worked as TDP continued to rise. I love it.

View attachment 207896

"Question guys...How "rare" and how good as investment are ATI 3870 X2 and Matrox Parhelia?"

The 3870 and 3870x2 are at the perfect age for low value and high volume availability before availability will likely fall in 2+ years. You can get them super cheap if you wait around for a deal. If you pick one up look up past sales and wait around for one to pop up cheap and you will basically have no risk. However I dont see it getting crazy expensive except for maybe the non reference designs.

THX and what's the good price for 3870 X2 in yours opinion atm?I keep seeing all kind of prices on Ebay all the way up to the 200+$.....Asking because I have some offer to get one of those.....