I distantly remember a guy who was dying of cancer, but kept up an absolute tirade against EA. There was so much ill will then, it would be funny if they made the same mistake.
I don't know if you are talking about Total Biscuit, but you've reminded me of Total Biscuit.
Dedicated GPUs were pretty common in the 2000s, they were required for most games, unlike the 90s where it was an unstandardized wild west. The failure rate had to be higher, I know I had 3 cards die with less than 2 years use on each card in the 2000s. Cases back then had terrible airflow and graphic demands jumped quickly.