I don't know how much proof is that. E.g. in the second half of 1998 when I was building my first computer, I was recommended by a CompUSA employee that I buy an ATI Xpert98 card (Rage Pro). I bought it... it worked but wasn't so great. 😜

(store recommendations sometimes rely heavily on their stock and what they want to push out the shelves).

stamasd wrote on 2024-09-20, 17:30:

(store recommendations sometimes rely heavily on their stock and what they want to push out the shelves).

Exactly. Profitability for the store overwhelmingly outweighs the actual needs of customers.

stamasd wrote on 2024-09-20, 17:30:

I don't know how much proof is that. E.g. in the second half of 1998 when I was building my first computer, I was recommended by a CompUSA employee that I buy an ATI Xpert98 card (Rage Pro). I bought it... it worked but wasn't so great. 😜

(store recommendations sometimes rely heavily on their stock and what they want to push out the shelves).

Rage Pro in the 2nd half of 98 is gross negligence. I mean even if you were hardset on pushing an ATI product, why not the Rage 128? There should have been plenty on the shelf by that point.

Hey, I learned that lesson and not too long after that got a TNT2 (Guillemot Maxi Gamer Cougar). Still have the Rage Pro in my stash for "testing" with.

BitWrangler wrote on 2024-09-20, 15:54:

The other games OP remembers playing might be diagnostic.

The games I remember playing that needed the 3D acceleration at the time were Elite Force, Jedi Outcast, Starfleet Command 3, Elite Force II, Return to Castle Wolfenstien, and Call of Duty. I think maybe I had the Halo demo on there towards the end. Not the most refined selection, heh. Might have had to turn some stuff down on halo, but in general I think it handled whatever else at 800x600 or 1024x768 alright.

Halo PC requires a Geforce256/Radeon 7000 minimum to startup at all, so I think we can rule out Rages/Kyros/Savages/Voodoos/MGAs/TNTs/Vantas/Xperts. 😀

My bet would be on the GF3 Ti 200 or Radeon 7500. both good performance & price point mid-pack cards around that time period.

stamasd wrote on 2024-09-20, 17:30:

I don't know how much proof is that. E.g. in the second half of 1998 when I was building my first computer, I was recommended by a CompUSA employee that I buy an ATI Xpert98 card (Rage Pro). I bought it... it worked but wasn't so great. 😜

(store recommendations sometimes rely heavily on their stock and what they want to push out the shelves).

This sums up my in-store experiences.

I never asked for recommendations as I knew what I was there to buy, but if I asked if they had it in stock....I often got their "recommendations" anyway. Was even told a few times I was wrong in my selection.

However, what I did buy in December 2001 was a Radeon 8500 64 (pretty sure it was December, may have been early January 02).

My wife and I were sharing a PC at that time so I got something that worked best for both of us, and I was an ATI fanboy back then. 😜

DrAnthony wrote on 2024-09-20, 22:04:

stamasd wrote on 2024-09-20, 17:30:

I don't know how much proof is that. E.g. in the second half of 1998 when I was building my first computer, I was recommended by a CompUSA employee that I buy an ATI Xpert98 card (Rage Pro). I bought it... it worked but wasn't so great. 😜

(store recommendations sometimes rely heavily on their stock and what they want to push out the shelves).

Rage Pro in the 2nd half of 98 is gross negligence. I mean even if you were hardset on pushing an ATI product, why not the Rage 128? There should have been plenty on the shelf by that point.

None until the very end of the year.

Putas wrote on 2024-09-23, 19:56:

DrAnthony wrote on 2024-09-20, 22:04:

stamasd wrote on 2024-09-20, 17:30:

I don't know how much proof is that. E.g. in the second half of 1998 when I was building my first computer, I was recommended by a CompUSA employee that I buy an ATI Xpert98 card (Rage Pro). I bought it... it worked but wasn't so great. 😜

(store recommendations sometimes rely heavily on their stock and what they want to push out the shelves).

Rage Pro in the 2nd half of 98 is gross negligence. I mean even if you were hardset on pushing an ATI product, why not the Rage 128? There should have been plenty on the shelf by that point.

None until the very end of the year.

I got a Rage Pro Turbo in 1998 as well. Part of that was due to the value that card had; it was a good-enough DirectX 5 part with 8 MB of RAM and AGP support in an era where a better solution was usually more expensive. A TNT would have ballooned the cost of the $2,000 CAD my family was already spending on a Pentium II-300/440BX/64 MB RAM system with an AWE64 and a 6.4 GB hard drive, an i740 would have been more of a headache based on some testing I finally did a couple of months ago, and a Riva 128 would have been faster but had differently bad image quality. Since we were upgrading from a 486 DX2-66, any hardware acceleration was better than no acceleration at all, and the Rage Pro fit the bill until I replaced it in 2000 with a Savage4 AGP card (the best I could get new with my summer job money that was eaten up almost entirely by fuel for the truck I needed to get to work).

I have a feeling the most popular cards were GeForce2 MX variants until GeForce4 MX came in.

Putas wrote on 2024-09-23, 19:56:

DrAnthony wrote on 2024-09-20, 22:04:

stamasd wrote on 2024-09-20, 17:30:

I don't know how much proof is that. E.g. in the second half of 1998 when I was building my first computer, I was recommended by a CompUSA employee that I buy an ATI Xpert98 card (Rage Pro). I bought it... it worked but wasn't so great. 😜

(store recommendations sometimes rely heavily on their stock and what they want to push out the shelves).

Rage Pro in the 2nd half of 98 is gross negligence. I mean even if you were hardset on pushing an ATI product, why not the Rage 128? There should have been plenty on the shelf by that point.

None until the very end of the year.

Oh you know, you're right. I remember now, wasn't it an August "soft launch" and then they actually showed up somewhere around November to January. I was right in that I remembered them being slow movers on the shelf, but totally forgot that it was because they were like 6 months late and better products were either already on the shelf or announced to be coming soon. I got one dirt cheap around that time, well under 100 bucks at Circuit City I believe.

I bought a gf3 ti 200 around this time upgrading from a voodoo 3 pci. I think it was about $200. This was to pair with my athlon tb 1.2 / asus mb.
The next card after that was the ati 9600 with half-life 2.