My list:

1. R9 290 - last GPU before 20 nm disaster (not mentioned in the topic, it wasn’t Kepler that got parity in terms of tech process, it was that ATi lost its edge when 20nm didn’t bear fruit)

2. 9500 non pro (L-shaped memory bank) - a fairly good chance to unlock it to 9700

3. N21 varieties (it’d be the first but mining craze killed it)

4. Cypress - another Khan like success that forced nV to start to play dirty (mGPU frametime “analysis”, GameWorks, PhysX etc), wood screw-augmented “Thermi” flagship in Jen-Hsun hands

5. R580 - another glimmer before the big disaster (history certainly repeats sometimes) and an example of quick recovery after so-so R520 (and terribad medium/low-end parts)

What are you on about, nvidia had to lower price on 780 twice and issue an emergency SKU in form of 780Ti to be able to compete on price/performance with Hawaii. R9 290 (non-X) was a steal at its price considering how long it managed to stay relevant in the years ahead. GCN driver improvement also added a significant chunk of performance (9k GS in FS at release and around 15k with OC and driver improvements 3 years later). Also, Kepler blower cards were also loud, so the point is sort of not a point at all

Another game with upscaling baked into all presets. “Free performance” they said. I expect frame hallucination tech to be included in these presets in 1-2 years tops

If you are an overclocker, N3x cards are less interesting as they are completely locked down while you can increase all limits except max frequency for n2x cards. 6800xt can get around 20-25% more performance with OC even on air, so it’s value would be actually higher than stock performance suggests