HELP, Building Gaming Computer

[vaporize]

This is my first time building a computer.

So far I bought:
-Asylum GeForce4 ti4200 128 mb ddr
-80 GB Western Digital 7200 rpm 8 mb buffer
-512 pc3200 ddr ram
-Fudin ATX case 350 W
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$320, i can return these & get something else if someone knows anything better


1. If price does not matter what would processor would you guys choose, P4 2.4 GHz or AMD Athlon XP2400+?

2. Why does the clock rates for the AMD cards keep going up and down?
(XP2400+ @ 2.0 GHz; XP2500+ @ 1.83 GHz; XP2600 @ 2.08)
so would the XP2400+ processor be faster that XP2500+ since it has the higher clock rate

3. what board is the best for graphics, ABIT, ASUS, EPOX?
(Does it matter if it has nForce2, KT333, KT400), what should I look for on the board?

-Thanks

 

[smahoney]

What you have is a good place to start. You only have one stick of RAM so I will only talk about single channel solutions.

1. I would recommend a 2.4GHz based on my experience - the price is pretty stable and they overclock pretty well even with the stock cooler. The 845PE chipset is mature, fast and stable.

2. The clock rates are not what is confusing you - it is the amount of cache that is included that is changing the AMD numbering scheme. The 2400+ is running faster than the 2500+ but has less cache on the chip.

3. Since you are using an add-in AGP card - The motherboard has little impact on performance unless you have dual-DDR. Since you are looking at a 2.4 or 2400+ and have a 4200 video card, the difference would be minimal to undetectable.

As far as what to look for on the board - figure out what peripherals you have or want? Do you want onboard LAN, Sound, Firewire? How many USB ports do you need? Based on what you have I would recommend a 2.4GHz 533MHz FSB CPU and an Abit BH-7 motherboard.