--- title: The first 3Dfx card: Orchid Righteous 3D | daily.dev description: The Orchid Righteous 3D, announced in 1996, was the first consumer graphics card based on 3Dfx technology, retailing for $299. Despite early yield issues with... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-3dfx-card-orchid-righteous-3d-tha503sqm twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: The first 3Dfx card: Orchid Righteous 3D | daily.dev og:description: The Orchid Righteous 3D, announced in 1996, was the first consumer graphics card based on 3Dfx technology, retailing for $299. Despite early yield issues with... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-3dfx-card-orchid-righteous-3d-tha503sqm og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/Tha503sqM.png og:image:alt: The first 3Dfx card: Orchid Righteous 3D og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # The first 3Dfx card: Orchid Righteous 3D **[Two Stop Bits](https://daily.dev/sources/twostopbits)** · 5 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary The Orchid Righteous 3D, announced in 1996, was the first consumer graphics card based on 3Dfx technology, retailing for $299. Despite early yield issues with 3Dfx chips, it beat the competition to market, delivering arcade-quality graphics to PCs. The card used the proprietary Glide API and had no 2D capability, functioning instead as an add-in card alongside a regular 2D card. Its high performance helped 3Dfx dominate the market, making the Righteous 3D a sought-after collectible today. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: --- Tags: [#gaming](https://daily.dev/tags/gaming), [#gpu](https://daily.dev/tags/gpu), [#hardware](https://daily.dev/tags/hardware) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-3dfx-card-orchid-righteous-3d-tha503sqm) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"The first 3Dfx card: Orchid Righteous 3D","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-3dfx-card-orchid-righteous-3d-tha503sqm","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-3dfx-card-orchid-righteous-3d-tha503sqm"},"datePublished":"2025-03-21T19:55:29.203Z","dateModified":"2026-10-15T02:24:48.809Z","description":"The Orchid Righteous 3D, announced in 1996, was the first consumer graphics card based on 3Dfx technology, retailing for $299. Despite early yield issues with...","image":"https://i0.wp.com/dfarq.homeip.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/orchid-righteous-3d-first-3dfx-social.jpg?fit=892%2C502\u0026ssl=1","thumbnailUrl":"https://i0.wp.com/dfarq.homeip.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/orchid-righteous-3d-first-3dfx-social.jpg?fit=892%2C502\u0026ssl=1","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"Two Stop Bits","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Two Stop Bits","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--BScjOU_Q--/f_auto/v1728977574/logos/twostopbits","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/twostopbits"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-3dfx-card-orchid-righteous-3d-tha503sqm","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"gaming,gpu,hardware","timeRequired":"PT5M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Two Stop Bits","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/twostopbits"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"The first 3Dfx card: Orchid Righteous 3D"}]} ```