Conclusion
NVIDIA's former top-of-the-line GeForce 5950 Ultra exhibits clear performance deficits, especially for the latest games, such as Farcry and Doom 3. For this reason, NVIDIA sorely needed the GeForce 6600 GT AGP. We found that the new card performs quite well. At the same time, we were surprised to note that the discontinued Radeon 9800 Pro - available today in the same midrange $199 - $249 price region - holds its own against the 6600 GT AGP very well in some categories. But although it is nearly as fast or even slightly faster in some games, the Radeon 9800 Pro can't keep up with the 6600 GT AGP in most areas. Perhaps ATI will decide to follow suit and launch a Radeon X700 XT with AGP.
The GeForce 6600 GT AGP has an excellent price-performance ratio, providing good "bang for the buck". We found that the HSI bridge has no negative effect on gaming performance. So if you're looking for an affordable performance booster for an otherwise adequately-powered AGP system, this card is the way to go.
