Lookin for a new MotherBoard

[Duper]

I'm lookin at buildin a new rig a couple of months (maybe sooner) Any suggestions?

I'm thinking of going duel core. (I haven't decided on AMD or Intel yet.)
SLI isn't necessary

[Krom]

You can quit thinking about going dual core, unless you want to buy something that is already a couple years old they have all but quit making single core processors. You might even want to think about jumping straight to quad core.

But that really depends on budget. For starters lets shoot a bunch of questions: How much are you willing to spend? How old is your existing computer and what are its specs? What do you use it for? What sort of usable lifespan are you looking for? And what is the most frustrating thing about your current computer?

[Duper]

SYSTEM:
mobo: Asus A8N-E
CPU: Athlon64 3500+
VID: Nvidia 8600GT
M: 2 Gig 2400 Corsair
Sound: SB X-Fi Audio [B000]
OS: XP PRO
IE 6 & FireFox
Dx 9.0c


I'm lookin at about $1200 to $1800

My old system (this one) has some limitations where newer tech is concerned.
Some of the buses are slower than desired as this board is old already.

Quad huh? Has the tech stabilized then? I'm looking at medium high-end. I like to build with about 4 years life in mind. (getting kinda hard these days to do that) But this is likely the last gaming box I'll put together. At 44 years old, there are other things I need to be tending to. Like art, the higher end will help there.
For a vid, I'm thinking of a 9800Gt, although I haven't priced them yet. And I don't know where our how the ATI's are in the mix these days. I quit trying to keep up with Tech a couple of years ago. The sound card I have now is fine. A new monitor will be in the mix as well. a 20\" something. Also thinkin about 6 to 8 gig ram. Soo,, i guess Vista is in my future. *sigh*

anyrate, is that enough to start with?

[Krom]

Both AMD and Intel are producing chips that are native quad core, unlike the old Core 2 Quad that was two dual cores on one package. However there are some advantages to sticking to the more mature Core 2 Duo and Quad chips. For one gaming performance of the native quad core i7 chip isn't that much greater than the Core 2 clock for clock, the Core 2 is considerably less expensive and it can be paired with less expensive DDR2 memory instead of the DDR3 requirement of the i7.

For a video card, the 9800 GT is barely touching high end. If you want something that will keep games moving well in to next year, get a GTX260 core 216 or even a full blown GTX280 if you can afford it.

If you get a core i7, most likely you will end up with 6 GB of RAM since they operate in triple channel configuration so you would have 3x 2GB sticks. If you get a Core 2 Duo, you can have a configuration of 4 or 8 GB of RAM for fairly cheap. But regardless of 4, 6 or 8 GB, you will require a 64 bit operating system to use it all and XP 64 isn't really recommended.

Edit: I was expecting this sooner or later and it came out today.
http://www.anandtech.com/guides/showdoc.aspx?i=3474

[Canuck]

P5Q X48 chipset series has been good to me for the Intel quad core Q9550, loaded with features and really solid.. one thing though all motherboards have their quirks at times. For the i7 the Asus P6T X58 would be my first choice. My roommate was the biggest AMD fan-boy out there but recently switched to Intel and loves it.

I dunno if I wanna lay out more money for the next Windows OS, just forked out another $600.00 for all the Vista crap and kept my XP pro partition.

[Duper]

awesome!

Thanks guys! this is definitely plenty to chew on.

one more question. Is there a big enough bump between DDR3 and DDR2 to worry about it?

[JMEaT]

Core i7 is awesome. Intel has a sub 300 dollar version out now that smacks many of their more expensive parts.

Here is a good read on DDR3 vs. DDR2: http://www.anandtech.com/memory/showdoc.aspx?i=2989