Look at the wreckage of this graphics card. No, it is not a visual relic. This is a masterpiece in graphics card history, the Voodoo 5 6000, for sale on eBay. This was the last graphics card from 3dfx Interactive, once famous for dominating the graphics industry. Unfortunately, the company went bankrupt before this GPU hit the market, and the card was only produced in very small numbers as a prototype.

This exact listing is for the Voodoo 6 6000 revision 3700A, one of the last ones produced before the entire prototype project was shut down. This also means that it is one of the few Voodoo models with most bugs squashed. The card is manufactured on a 250nm process, a far cry from the 7nm process node primarily used in today's best graphics cards (opens in new tab).

The card is currently listed for $13,200 (opens in new tab) (via Sweclockers (opens in new tab)), a figure that is steadily rising by the day. There are still five days left in the auction period, so by the time the auction is over, it will be worth a lot of money. After all, it is a very sought-after prize for collectors.

"I have come to the conclusion that this card is not the Holy Grail for me. There are other pieces in my vintage hardware collection that have and will always have more meaning to me," the seller wrote.

"This card has been considered the ultimate Holy Grail for most, if not all 3DFX enthusiasts/collectors. As such, I want to give this card to someone who will see it that way and have warm and special feelings for it. I want to give this card to someone who will cherish it for years to come and preserve the history and importance it has in the 3D world."

The Voodoo line of GPUs is the most influential graphics card in the history of PC gaming (opens in new tab). Nvidia and AMD (and Intel) may be the only graphics card manufacturers recognized today, but it was 3dfx that made the first decent graphics accelerator cards out of the primitive PC mud in the late 90s. Its most impressive product was Voodoo.

If you ask PC gamers of the 90s what their favorite graphics card was, it would probably be the Voodoo or Voodoo2, although some might like Nvidia's Riva card or the "world's first GPU," the GeForce 256, the Voodoo card, hold a special place in the hearts of PC gamers of that era.

For 3dfx, all was going well: stiff competition from GeForce and Radeon (made by ATI, not AMD at the time) was putting a lot of pressure on 3dfx. Unfortunately, 3dfx was unable to offer an alternative to the fast-paced and rapidly growing market, and by the time it had answers for Nvidia and ATI cards, it was on the brink of collapse.

3dfx was then absorbed by Nvidia (open in new tab) and never recovered from the final blow. 3dfx offered Nvidia its patents, brand name, and product inventory, which nearly eliminated 3dfx and strengthened Nvidia's efforts to compete with ATI ATI then became a major player in the AMD market in 2006. ATI was then acquired by AMD in 2006, so it became the two-horse race that the graphics card world has been accustomed to for decades. Since last year, Intel has also entered the game, making it a three-horse race far ahead of Nvidia.

Perhaps in another world, 3dfx would have remained and PC gamers would have been more accustomed to buying the latest $1,200 Voodoo 20K instead of a GeForce. Unfortunately, the closest we can get is this $13,000+ Voodoo 5 6000, which sadly is even further out of my price range than the GeForce RTX 4090 (open in new tab).

Actually, there is another path to Voodoo 5 nirvana. One modder decided enough was enough and decided to create his own Voodoo 5 6000 clone (opens in new tab) a few years ago. They created a complete working model of the card, BIOS and all...