WHILE WE WERE extremely impressed with the GeForce 6600 GT when it was launched back in September, the card's PCI Express X16 interface left us longing for an AGP flavor. It's wasn't that we didn't like PCI Express, but the only commercially available PCI Express platform was saddled with the Pentium 4's comparatively poor gaming performance. Since September, we've previewed Athlon 64 chipsets with PCI Express support from ATI, NVIDIA, and VIA, but none are available in production motherboards just yet. You'll still need an LGA775 Pentium 4 or Celeron processor if you want to get in on PCI Express graphics.

Fortunately, you don't need PCI Express to get in on the GeForce 6600 GT, at least not anymore. With a little help from its High Speed Interconnect (HSI) bridge chip, NVIDIA has brought the GeForce 6600 GT to AGP. Was anything lost in the translation? Read on as we explore the GeForce 6600 GT AGP's performance against its PCI Express counterpart and mid-range competition.