I initially misremembered the age of the card, but it was about that old when I bought it.

My hope was that they would find a higher-level place to modularize the render than llvmpipe, although I agree that was unreasonable technical choice.

Once-in-a-generation technology cliff-edges have to happen. Hopefully not too often. It's just not pleasant being caught on the wrong side of the cliff!

Thanks for the insights.