Hi
Personally I prefer the text.
I thought about a tooltip that pops up instantly. If you want an example, go to http://www.janaserver.de/start.php?lang=en and move your mouse over the top menu bar. <<
Those popups are great at first, but can become very annoying very quickly.
The best approach might be a system that allows you to switch between text, icons or (icon + tips) in real time, and possibly have a cookie or a per DB phpmyadmin_settings table to remember the users choice.
Regards Peter Kelly