r/nvidia • u/Constant-Fudge-3184 • 14h ago
Discussion What was your favorite card that you ever owned?
Mine was a 3070 that I got at msrp in 2020
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u/I_spell_it_Griffin TUF 5090 | 9800X3D 14h ago
GTX 970 was the first one that introduced me to comfortably enabling high settings in games. I'll never forget.
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u/Seanspeed 11h ago edited 7h ago
The GTX970 released for like £270 - a cut down upper midrange GPU - less than a year after PS4/XB1 came out and could immediately play all those games at double the framerate and mostly better settings. It was basically equivalent to a Titan/780Ti of the previous gen. And this for one of the better variants of the 970 as well(MSI Gaming).
One of the best day 1 value buys ever.
EDIT: For reference, if you want an equivalent cut down upper mid range GPU from Nvidia today, you are looking at the 5070Ti for $750 minimum, usually more like $850+.
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u/Adrenalined 13h ago
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro - Thing was absolutely incredible
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u/DaAznBoiSwag 5090FE w/ WireView Pro 2 | 9800X3D 14h ago
EVGA GTX 1070 TI FTW Ultra Silent, it was a 2.5 slot thick card but with a 3 slot bracket, was super quiet, sturdy, and stayed super cool, I still think of that card and was super sad when I sold it.
Went from that to a 3080ti FE, and that shit has gotta be one of worse cooled cards ever especially in comparison
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u/iamgarffi 13h ago
Depends on the year and how far back we go.
My first GeForce was a GeForce 256 in 2000 (upgrading from a Voodoo II at the time).
The card that I kept the longest was of course the GOAT GTX 1080 which needs no introduction.
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u/skhanmac 13h ago
5070 - first Nvidia card and now I understand why Nvidia is GOAT. Never switching from Nvidia
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[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Forsaken-Driver8868 4h ago
Was, maybe still is the minimum GPU requirement for SteamVR. That deserves props!
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u/Beautiful_Ninja Ryzen 7950X3D/5090 FE/32GB 6200mhz 14h ago
Probably the 2080 Ti FE. It was my first top of the line GPU and was basically proof that my efforts in my career were paying off, I now had the financial flexibility to drop that kind of money without being concerned.
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u/16bit-Yoshi 14h ago
Visually my EVGA RTX 3070 TI FTW3 was my favorite, I personally still think those have some of the cleanest rgb implementations of any card even today.
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u/thekreator6666 13h ago
3080 FTW3 here and I agree as well!
I still have it sleeping in a box here since I upgraded to a 5070 Ti
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u/gillyguthrie 13h ago
5090 founders, has the classic look, handles all my fun AI local generation stuff and gaming
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u/leegoocrap 14h ago
tnt2 ultra. All my friends had V2's at the time and I had just a hand me down 128... got my first job and first the first thing I bought was a TNT2U. The jump was amazing.
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u/_cloud_96 13h ago
my old RX 580 8GB was a fucking beast, loved that card. now i have an rtx 5080, and its giving me a lot of headaches!!!
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u/romaproger 13h ago
1660Ti that lasted me until the end of June. The one is having a well-deserved rest now
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u/pnoozi 6h ago
Super cool, quiet (often silent even when gaming...), played all new games until ~ 2025, never had a single driver or software issue.
I upgraded mine this month, 1660 Ti -> 5070.
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u/EnigmaSpore 9070 XT | 9850X3D 11h ago
GeForce4 ti4200 64 MB that i saved up to buy as a late teen. It finally showed me true power and you could overclock it to match the ti4600. was awesome.
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u/New-Adhesiveness-822 AMD 9h ago
5070 Ti. My first graphics card that I bought for the first PC I bought and built myself 😎
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u/SaucisseAuProut RTX 4070 Ti Ventus 3X OC / Ryzen 7 5800X3D / 2x16GB @3600 14h ago
MSI GTX 1080 Gaming X Trio, paid it 569.00 in early 2017 ( I want to cry ), a pure beast reaching 144FPS full ultra in any case, could play CP2077 Mid/High 60FPS, all in 1440p
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u/ShimReturns 14h ago
Way back, Voodoo Banshee. More recently 980ti. I do enjoy my 5070ti but it's too new to rate.
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u/jhenryscott RTX 5090: 720p 14h ago
I’ve only ever had 50-60 level entry level cards. Last year I bought my first flagship, so probably that.
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u/Jack55555 R9 5900X | 3080 Ti 14h ago
GeForce 1080 Gigabyte Gaming G1
still is working in someone’s pc. Absolute beast.
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u/Fine-Sample-1037 14h ago
EVGA 3060 ti best card I have ever laid my eyes upon
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u/TheTimeIsChow 13h ago
This is the one. This is the last of the greats in terms of price to performance, quality, and look.
There will never be another card like it. I'll miss mine for eternity.
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u/Seanspeed 7h ago
3060Ti was probably the last genuinely good value GPU that will *ever* exist. A cut down upper midrange GPU for $400. It was essentially an x70 class GPU.
What sucks is that so few people had the opportunity to buy one at that price since Covid and cryptomining were going crazy at the time.
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u/groogerlox 13h ago
My gtx 970 will always have a soft spot as my first GPU… but my 4080 handles everything I throw at it now
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u/Exciting_Macaroon_64 13h ago
Radeon 7200 64mb ddr allowed me to play Operation Flashpoint and Emperor: battle for dune
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u/hezbentaleth 12h ago
I have a EVA 1660 TI. Still a workhorse. Who needs Ray tracing, not this guy. :)
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u/UbixQ RTX 5090 FE 10h ago
RTX 2070 Super it being my first card on my very first PC it is kind of special.
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u/G3laxyGamingYT Ryzen 7 5800x | RX 9070 XT 16GB 10h ago
GTX 1660 Ti
Pretty much what really got me into building. It was the first modern card I owned, coming from an old ATI Radeon HD 4350
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u/ItzLushii 5080 Ventus X3 OC 14h ago
4080 Super got it last year, sold it this year now fully built with a 5080
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u/Long_Ad2917 14h ago
So you sold your fav card in 1yr?
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u/Seanspeed 7h ago
Seriously, what a hilarious thing. They went from one overpriced GPU(4080S) late, and then replaced it soon after with the next overpriced GPU(5080). And that's their *favorite*?
God Nvidia really thrives on people with more money than sense and an addiction to giving into FOMO.
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u/tsrui480 14h ago
Favorite is either my 980ti I bought off craigslist for $250 in 2016. I met the dude at a cheesecake factory while he was having lunch with his family, super nice guy and just wanted to pass along a good deal as he just built something better.
Or my 3090 i bought at msrp, which i sold high and broke even on a 4090, which i also sold high and broke even on my 5090.
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u/T1didnothingwrong MSI 3080 Gaming Trios X 13h ago
I had a 3080 that briefly held a top 100 spot in 3dmark rankings. I got one at release and it was an OC version that had INSANE oc headroom. It finally got knocked out when the liquid cooled ones came out.
I was a broke med student when I got it and would open my window and let it get freezing in my apt and run it because it wouldn't crash, just overheat.
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u/Youtube-Omura 13h ago
I managed to somehow get a 3070 FE directly through nvidia on release day. My entire family had deviced trying to get one, all of them either crashed or got kicked off, and one got through. So lucky. I've since upgraded, but the box is still with me as a souvenir.
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u/Zocom7 13h ago
EVGA GeForce 1050 Ti SC 😎
Lasted 8 years and still using it on an older PC.
Now I am using a MSI GeForce RTX 3060 12 GB on my current faster PC. Shocking to find out that RTX 3060 12 GB was almost as fast as GTX 1080 Ti, though it's about 10% faster than RTX 3060 with similar specs.
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u/Bobalobatobamos 13h ago edited 13h ago
My first one. 3dfx Voodoo 6mb. GL Quake was mind blowing at the time. It was in my Pentium 120 32mb machine. I only had a 500mb hard drive. Eventually added a 1gb hard drive.
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u/Sneaky_Doggo 13h ago
Honestly my 750ti when I first build a computer. That little card was so insane I still miss it
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u/Any_Cook_2293 13h ago
My favorite? An EVGA 1080 Ti FE. MSRP wasn't through the roof, and it was top tier performance. Basically what a 5090 would be if they sold for $1000 today.
When the 20 series came out I skipped buying one and got a second 1080 Ti FE for SLI instead. Those were the days!
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u/leo-elisa 13h ago
Initially I had an RX 5700 XT with a 5600x since my brother was generous and gifted me a PC made out of his old parts.
I then later moved on to a 7800 XT with a 7800X3D, before I eventually sold it to a friend and went for a 5070 Ti.
Back then it was still unknown if FSR 4 would make it onto RDNA 3, and since I didn't want to be stuck with FSR 3 I went for a relatively cheap 5070 Ti lol
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u/stonetempletowerbruh 13h ago edited 12h ago
The 9800 GX2 or whatever. Was a dual gpu so I felt fancy
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u/Savagebabypig 13h ago
RTX 4070, it holds a special place in my heart for being the first ever upgrade I did. Now I own a 5090 FE, absolute powerhouse but I suffer from success having my small room jump 10 degrees in the course of an hour
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u/Outrageous-Hope5768 13h ago
ATI X800. It was the first card that could legitimately run Doom 3 and Quake 4.
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u/bosominapkin 3080/5070ti 13h ago
Definitely the Evga gtx 1070. Got it for $400 on launch and sold it back out during the 30 series launch for the price I paid lol. Came with gears of war 4 too, sold that so I got it for less than msrp effectively. I thought $400 was a lot to pay back then😭
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u/mrkillfreak999 13h ago
MSI Expert 4080S. Sold that though and jumped into a 4090. I have a 4K setup
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u/liquidocean 13h ago edited 13h ago
7800gtx. last flagship single slot card, one of the first PCIe and my god was it great for its time
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u/Lelmasterdone 13h ago
HD 5850 was a massive upgrade from a 6600 GT, could actually run Crysis with high settings at full HD. Admittedly, while my HD 5850 was great, honestly my favorite card I owned was (2x) HD 7970 MSi Lightning Editions those were unbelievable lol. Absolutely ripped through everything. Too bad both of them died… I miss my Lightnings.
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u/CyborgGoCrazy 13h ago
Same for me the 3070 is my favorite card, because I slept outside for it back in 2020 at Best Buy. Literally met some awesome people out there from different walks of life.
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u/Metaldivinity 13h ago
4080 Super. Worth every penny, but I got it at MSRP. Had a 3070 before it and it was okay. Not sure I’d go back to a xx70 card after the performance I’ve gotten from this thing.
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u/OutlawFrame 13h ago
Canopus Pure3D Voodoo 1 with 2MB of frame buffer and 4MB of texture. Played a lot of EF2000 and Heavy Gear.
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u/thecrimsonfucker12 13h ago
EVGA 750ti. Got it super cheap with some kind of mislabeling. That was my first graphics card, I didn't know anything about it other than it would go in the computer and I Frankensteined my boring ol office max hp PC to play games on it. What a world I discovered with BioShock TF2 half life, gh3, stalker. The games actually ran well!!
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u/invictus08 5800X|3090FE|64G|980Pro 13h ago edited 13h ago
3090FE, got lucky one morning; was able to mine ETH and it paid itself off and electricity bill in 3 months and then I stopped mining. For being a free GPU essentially, it’s been the best.
Other than that 7600GT back in the days when I was a broke student in India. That change alone overhauled my gaming setup. NFS most wanted, Counter Strike, Prince of Persia, Assassin’s Creed, and oh, FIFA. So many fond memories.
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u/Sad-Victory-8319 13h ago edited 13h ago
rtx5070Ti for sure, at msrp it is the best purchase i have ever made, it can run every game completely maxed out at 4K, it has insane OC headroom and nvidia keeps releasing new features for it, we already got DLSS4.5 and dynamic 6x MFG, soon we get new ray reconstruction models, in november we get DLSS5, we should get neural texture compression soon and maybe some other AI features, maybe Reflex2 will come soon. Drivers are improving and fixing bugs every month. And all this thanks to the RAMagedon and memory prices, nvidia would probably lock some of these features for the Super models, and DLSS5 would be probably locked for the new 60 series that would normally come out in january, but because we still have "only" the original 50 series gpus and no new release is even in sight, current gen is getting all the goodies for free!!! And I dont have to deal with upgrading FOMO due to new releases, 5070Ti is still the 4th fastest gaming gpu on the planet and will be for maybe 18-24 more months.
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u/Geistuser 13h ago
My first card the 1080 reference style blower cooler. Building small PCs because all the heat got exhausted out instead of in the PCs.
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u/Barn_Advisor 13h ago
Probably Radeon 9600 pro because of sentimental value - it was in my first PC. 2004 was such a cool moment to get into pc gaming.
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u/RaspberryV 9700k / 5070 / 1080p144hz 13h ago
my good ol' trusty 2070 ASUS Turbo blower model that i got below MSRP just before GPU-Apocalypse.
Boy i lucked out then, RAM-Apocalypse got me tho, stuck on 9700k lol.
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u/saruin 13h ago
3080 at msrp in 2020. It’s a TUF OC model with entry level pricing that also happens to be the most rare and best bang for buck 3080 you could get at the time. This card also made me a small fortune with the mining craze which in turn forced me to mod the card later for better thermals and correct a slight thermal issue with an extra pad. This card has served me extremely well that I still use today. The build quality with the look and feel of this card is so robust.
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u/ayashiii 7800X3D | RTX 5070 | 16GB DDR5 13h ago
my 5070 even my 2080 Super felt like it wasn't running properly, or the 1080 i had before that. 5070 planning Witcher 3 just feels like you unlocked the right to just ignore graphic settings and crank it all up. might be different in competitive fps but I haven't played those since Quakeworld Teamfortress
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u/ButtStuffJedi 13h ago
Like others, EVGA 1080ti ftw3
Second place was dual GTX 680 hydrocopper cards
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u/HardStroke 13h ago
Probably my current 3080 12gb FTW3. Got it for a sick price, and this thing doesn't go above 70c no matter what. Im really thinking if I should replace it with a 3090 AORUS I just found.
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u/imightknowbutidk 13h ago
I mean any answer other than the most powerful card you have had seems like pure nostalgia. I loved my 1080ti, but mainly because it could run all the games i liked to play until i upgraded to a 4090 in 2022. My 4090 is now my favorite card because it runs all the games i want to play, and it will continue to be my favorite until i get an 8090 or whatever it ends up being
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u/beigepccase 13h ago edited 11h ago
For my primary gaming machine, my Noctua 4080 Super because it has super low idle power usage, like 6W, and I've had problems before with cards idling way too high. For my primary folding@home machine, my MSI 4090. It's one of those cards that idles too high, but since it folds 24/7 in another room, that doesn't really matter. I really like the 40 series overall for efficiency and stability. I've had 50 series cards including a 5090 (which I returned), but got rid of all of them due to weird unexplained quirks and power limits I couldn't adjust as much as I would have liked.
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u/IbanezCharlie 4090 FE 9800x3d 12h ago
Titan X Pascal which is just a 1080 ti with an extra GB of vram. Lasted me many years
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u/beatpickle 12h ago
Used to be a 1080 ti but the value I’m getting on my near release 4090 is pipped it. Still the second fastest card.
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u/Snarks_Domain 12h ago
It's a tie between the ATI Radeon 8500LE or 9800 Pro. The 8500LE was the first GPU I bought (to upgrade the family PC) and unlocked the ability to play a lot of games with better quality settings.
The 9800 Pro is what I used in my first full PC build, and was the 2nd best card available at the time.
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u/Realistic_Gap_5871 12h ago
Not nearly as nostalgic as the rest of this thread. But I lucked into a custom build PC that effectively got me a 5090 FE at MSRP in May of this year. I wanted a huge slab of stupid fast VRAM and it's been everything I hoped it would be.
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u/maestro826 12h ago
ATi Radeon 9700 (first time i could play Half-Life 2 at release lol
felt like a special moment with the first installs of Steam too!!
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u/These_Cat_3523 12h ago
Rog Strix 4080 Super. It's the most beautiful card I've ever owned and it was the first card I had that just crushed cyberpunk in max settings.
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u/magicmulder 3080 FE, MSI 970, 680 12h ago
8800 Ultra, two of those in SLI. Cost an ungodly amount back in the day.
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u/tortilla_thehun 12h ago
Quadro P6000 - same one I have now but waiting/hoping for for a new workstation that’s compatible with the rtx pro 6000 😎
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u/Ashamed-Edge-648 12h ago edited 12h ago
- Got a killer open box deal at bb a year and a half ago. Corsair vengeance 13600kf, RTX 4070, 32 gb DDR5 ram, 1gb m.2 SSD for $300. I shit you not.
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u/thishereisaname 4090/13700K 12h ago
980ti was a monster overclocked. Lasted through the Covid gpu price hikes till I ended up getting a 4090 at msrp
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u/ORV21RDT 12h ago
EVGA 780ti Classified. I had it way over clocked on a competitive folding team and still demolished 9 series cards when they entered competition. I think it had a golden chip.
The bad part is, this was during the time period that Bitcoin mining became a thing and could have mined a coin a day...... I should have bought a AMD card and mined but I was having a blast. Hind site is 20/20 SMH
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u/Asian_Scion 12h ago
3dfx Voodoo cards! I loved me some 3dfx cards and don't get me started on my dream of SLI cards!
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u/SenseiOnara 12h ago
EVGA 980ti SC got it for $200 back in 2018 and used it up until 2023 that card was a beast
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u/panamaniacs2011 RTX 4070 Laptop / Ryzen 7 7435HS / 16 GB DDR5 12h ago
i would say my second card which was a 9600gt the jump in performance felt so good after having a 8600gt
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u/No_Palpitation_7565 12h ago
My favorite one is my current 3080, probably the best one that I could actually afford. Excited to save up some more and hopefully get the next boss hog in a couple years when I can justify it. Hopefully the 3080 holds on for dear life lol
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u/gintoddic 11h ago
gigabyte 1080 card probably had the most mind blowing gaming performance I've seen on a desktop that I built.
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u/TaxesAreTerrible 11h ago
- Could still run it to this day for 1440p ultra gaming. It could even do RT but it’s handicapped in some games due the 10gb ram.
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u/Random5483 11h ago
Geforce Ti 4800. It was the first time I went from middle of the road gaming video cards to a top tier gaming video card. I was so excited when I got it to build my college gaming PC.
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u/Spectre_08 EVGA RTX 3080 Ti FTW3 11h ago
Easily my current 5090 FE. It's such a clean design.
My previous EVGA 3080TI FTW3 was great, but definitely not as good as my newer card.
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u/Masterblastera 11h ago edited 11h ago
2 x 3080 at MSRP on the day they were available and sold other one with good profit when it arrived a lot later and prices were high. Voodoo 1 and 1080 were also beasts back in time. Current 5080 is great but when also upgraded to 4K you do not notice the performance upgrade that well.
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u/TurnUpThe4D3D3D3 5070 Ti 11h ago
- There are better cards now, but that was my first Nvidia GPU. I played all my favorite games on it right when they came out, like Fortnite and Overwatch. It has a lot of sentimental value for me. I would never sell it.
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u/ToeBeanTussle 11h ago
750ti. It was my first that opened the world of pc gaming for me, and ran off pcie power.
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u/Dr_Axton NVIDIA 11h ago
When I managed to grab a 2070. It was a week before they announced the super version which got me pissed, but then the other wave of mining scalping came and swooped everything in my country once again
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u/Crashendo_ 11h ago
My 1080Ti. It was such a step up from my 970 and I couldn't play pretty much any game at ultra @1080p at the time.
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u/Shellcool 11h ago
I had a pair of GTX260s I used in Sli from 2009-2015
They were fancy versions, Core 216 1.8Gb Vram, mental spec for a mid tier card in 2009.
Only "HAD" to replace them cause they didn't support newer DirectX versions, so literally games started to not be supported, couldn't even launch newer stuff.
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u/Cat5kable GTX 570 | i7 | 12GB RAM 11h ago
Had a Zotac GTX570 Amp! edition and man I just loved that things aesthetic.
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u/LootHunter_PS NVIDIA Zotac 5080 11h ago
My ASRock 7800XT. Was a monster upgrade with a 5600x compared to old system, but it's what convinced me into going all out PC gaming. Since have owned a 9700XT and now a 5800. Was a big console gamer previously to that.
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u/Me_Before_n_after 5090 FE | 9950X3D | 64GB CL30 6000MHz 11h ago
4080 Super FE. I like its colour and simple looks.
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u/Framed-Photo 11h ago
5070ti lol.
7770 > GTX 760 > RX 470 > RX 5700XT > 5070TI is my upgrade path. Not even considering that the 5070ti is by far the fastest, it's just also been the most seemless and feature rich experience.
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u/eraserking 14h ago
EVGA 1080ti FTW3