It feels like it’s been a while since I’ve taken a proper look at a graphics card, so I fixed that by pulling an old AMD gem out of a current project: the Radeon HD 6870 1GB from 2010. Back then, AMD were genuinely competing with Nvidia at basically every price/performance level, and in some areas (like IO) they were leagues ahead. This card is classic Terascale 2: 900MHz core, 1,120 shaders, 256-bit bus, PCIe Gen 2 x16, and about a 150W TDP. Mine’s a reference blower model too, and honestly it’s a nice balance—doesn’t get too hot, doesn’t get too loud, and I still love the plain design with the red accents (even if the lack of a backplate looks a bit odd). For modern gaming though, it’s rough. There’s no real driver support anymore (latest is around 2018), and you’re stuck with DirectX 11—so newer titles can throw errors or just run terribly. I tested a few “modern-ish” games anyway: Control at 1080p Low was basically a slideshow, Days Gone surprisingly launched but still wasn’t worth it, and Metro Exodus looked fine at Low but felt unplayable. Esports titles were more interesting: CS2 and Fortnite were actually playable at 1080p with low settings (and FSR in CS2), but Fortnite had nasty artifacting. The real takeaway: if you go back to early-to-mid 2010s games, the HD 6870 still has a place in a super cheap build—especially if you can grab one for throwaway money like the £10 I paid.