Are AGP graphic accelerators really faster than PCI graphics accelerators?

One of the justifications for charging hundreds of dollars more for the Sawtooth (over the now defunct Yikes) is the fact that it features an AGP slot for the graphics board.

When I conducted a reader survey, the AGP port was most often chosen as the reason for buying a Sawtooth.

With all the hullabaloo, owners of beige or blue 'n' white G3's are fearful that simply upgrading their G3 ZIF to a G4 ZIF isn't enough. Are they foolish to cling to PCI slot technology for their graphics accelerator? Or should they quickly sell their PCI machine to some poor devil and get an AGP model with an AGP accelerator?

Here's the answer:

3D TESTS

 

2D TESTS

 

Conclusion: There's no significant difference between the PCI and AGP versions of either Voodoo or RAGE boards when playing 3D games. Frame rate speed has more to do with the board than with the interface used.

As for the new ATI built RAGE Pro 128 being shipped with the latest Sawtooth crop, it's faster than the RAGE 128 but slower than any 3Dfx Voodoo2 or Voodoo3 I've tested.

The 2D tests gave mixed results for the NEW RAGE Pro 128 AGP. It was third fastest in the WordPerfect scrolling test but slowest in the Photoshop scrolling test. (I find the latter hard to believe so I will retest before posting the numbers.) As for AGP versus PCI, the AGP's ran faster in WordPerfect but were no different than PCI's in Photoshop.

NOTE: Both AGP and PCI versions of Voodoo3 3000 are available from Buy.Com at low, low prices.

 

• Test machines:
  G4/400 Yikes and G4/400 Sawtooth
• Test applications:
  Quake II, Unreal 2.2b7, WordPerfect 3.5.3, Adobe Photoshop 5.5