This page will show all objects that classify as Hercules 3D Prophet. The 3D Prophet has been made by Hercules, a name not unknown in the monochrome display world. They started in 1982 but we're acquired by ELSA during the 90's. The brandname was bought by Guillemot which sold somewhat more recent graphics and soundcards under the name Hercules. Today Hercules is focussing on PC imaging, audio and WiFi devices.
nVidia launched the GeForce 2 Ultra (press release) on 14 August 2000, this card is from 10 September 2000. The Ultra's were available pretty quick and offered the best 3D-performance at it's time. It's price-tag was about 500$ ~ 600$ US dollars (about 1600 Dutch guilders), not bad. > Read more
An engineering sample of Hercules' 3D Prophet 9700 Pro. It's based on the ATi Radeon 9700 Pro chip (R300) that was released on 7 August 2002. This card has a chip from week 32 (5 ~ 9 August) and a PCB date from week 34 (19 ~ 23 August) so it's an early, but finished (development-wise) card. Hercules probably used it for testing and/or validation purposes.
The 9700 Pro is a fully DirectX 9 compliant chip and outperforms the GeForce 4 Ti 4600. nVidia didn't have the GeForce FX ready until early 2003, leaving ATi 'alone' for half a year with the fasted 3D card. Because the GeForce FX isn't such a good performer ATi was facing a bright horizon here. This is the point when the Radeon became really popular! > Read more
One popular card, the 9800 Pro! It was sold by many brands of which Hercules was not the cheapest one. In the Netherlands the Club3D or Sapphire cards were often a tad cheaper and thus sold more.
This card doesn't differ much from the 256MB 9800 Pro, except that it has a smaller PCB, different cooling and a Hercules sticker.
As some of you may notice my Hercules card is red instead of blue. Hercules originally shipped blue 9800 Pro's but some red ones slipped through. I once heard someone saying that these are special versions but I just think that Hercules didn't have any blue PCB's left and took the normal red ones (which every other manufacturer used). However, an interesting twitch is the marking on the AGP connector. Besides 'A' someone wrote '8108' on it. > Read more
Hercules 3D Prophet II Ultra (AGP)