The current situation regarding video cards for Macintosh is not good (it's about 12 months behind the PC). The current PowerMac G3, Apple's desktop computer, comes with the ATI Rage 128 video card. While the Rage 128 is fast, it's not exactly breaking any records. ATI has a faster version of the Rage 128 for retail, but the performance of even the newer faster Rage 128 just does not reach the level of less expensive cards available for the PC market. Cards such as the Voodoo3 blow away the lowly ATI in terms of performance in both 2D and 3D. The 3dfx Voodoo Banshee has just entered the Mac market through several different vendors, but it, like the ATI card, is really last year's technology. With no insanely great 3D accelerators to use, what is a Mac guy with an eye for gaming to do?

For weeks, rumors have been running rampant throughout the Mac community that 3dfx is going to release Macintosh reference drivers for the Voodoo3. These fabled drivers would allow you too pick up a Voodoo3 2000 PCI (the only Voodoo3 PCI card currently available), and stick it in any PCI Mac. Well, we at Sharky Extreme are happy to tell you that, while not available for public release yet, these drivers do exist. The folks at 3dfx lent us a copy of the drivers (no, you can't have them, so don't ask) to play with and even do a bit of benchmarking. Read on to get the details.