Newbie guy building new system - Please critique

[Shiva]

This system will be used for flight sims for the most part but I would like "some" flexability for other uses. Starting with the basics, here's what I've come up with so far.

Abit KX7-333R PC2700 MoBo w/KT333 chipset
Athlon XP 2000+
Mushkin DDRAM 512 MB/PC2700
Maxtor 80GB 7200 RPM Ultra DMA 133

have not chosen any cases/PS's until I figure out the rest.

Any suggestions/comments about:
-the compatabilty of these components
-substitutions
-cases/PS's/cooling setups
would be greatly appreciated, thanx!

 

[acejj26]

go to newegg....

chiefec case (workstation tower) with 420 watt power supply for $79
room for 4 case fans

do you need a RAID motherboard if you're not gonna set up a RAID array??
AXP's can't take advantage of the extra memory bandwidth, so do you need a KT333 mobo??
memory looks good...so does the hard drive

maybe go with Abit KR7A (KT266A)
go with a nice video card too....though if you're playing a lot of flight sims, you'll be CPU limited for the most part, so you don't necessarily need a GF4 Ti4600...a Ti4400 would be nice, and it's about $100 cheaper...newegg has the Abit GF4 Ti4400 for $225

to recap, here's what i'd go with
Abit KR7A motherboard
AXP 2000+
Mushkin PC2700 512 MB
Maxtor 80 GB 7200 RPM HDD (get the one with the fluid bearings...nice and quiet)
Abit GF4 Ti4400
Chieftec Workstation Tower w/420 Watt power supply

 

[Shiva]

Good suggestions.

I don't need the RAID (didn't realilze that board was RAID, duh)
I have a nVIDIA gForce 3 ....what about nFORCE chip set? would this be better for gaming?
What about integrated graphics in conjuction with external Graphics card? I've heard conficting opinions about the combo and nFORCE in general.

thanks for your help!

 

[Shiva]

Also,

I've noticed a Western Digital SE 80MB that has 8MB cache, would this be a bonus over the standard 2MB cache in most other hard drives?