When the GTX 280 first launched, it retailed for the luxury price of $649. This coming at a time when everyone has already been in the groove of seeing killer >$300 GPUs for quite a while. NVIDIA knew it would be a hard sell, but it was a brand-new launch and one truly worthy of the "ultimate" title.

But then AMD unleashed their HD 4800, which delivered very surprising results. That immediately caused a few quiet price drops of the GTX 260 and 280, so that $649 price tag is a thing of the past. It's unfortunate for those early adopters, because most of the cards can now be found for around $500.