which cpu/vid to get plz help

Judging on your price range, for the cpu, get the X2 3800+Dual core for around $300. If not then go for X2 4200+Dual core for maybe $50 bucks more than the 4000+. I'd say dual core are a lot better for multitasking and gaming, plus you can oc this chips to higher speeds.

For the graphics cards, first of all there's a big difference on the price tag as 7600GT cost around $180-$230 and the 7800GT from $280-$350.

However, a 7900GT 256Mb would cost you as much as that of the 7800GT but the 7900GT outperforms the 7800GTX 256. So that makes it a great bang for the buck! So either you get the 7600GT or the 7900GT is good, but on the other hand if you want a good gaming card to pair up with your cpu then the 7900GT is the answer.

As for my final advice, assuming you're still on the budget, get the X2 4200+ and pair it up with the 7900GT. With your SLI mobo, maybe in several months you can upgrade to SLI. With these set up you'll have a great high perfomance gaming rig. Couple with good 2Gb ram, man, you can play the latest and most demanding games like FEAR and BF2 with good performance and quality.  

That or Im just a good slick used car salesman.  

I have a eVga GeForce 7800gt. I love it! It's very fast. I feel that the GT models offer so much more bang for the buck.

I would consider a 7800gt or 7900gt if I were you.

I do not know enough about processor revisions to address your CPU question. I recommend you look into Chuck's suggestion of thte 3800+ for much less, or for a little bit more the 4200+.

Just keep in mind that if you decide to go cheaper on the processor to make sure to buy one with 1MB of L2 cache and not 512KB. You can always overclock, nut you cannot add cache.

probably the best CPU for the money is the Opteron 165 it's dual core and it overclocks like crazy, as far as the video card goes i have a 7900 gt paired with an opteron 144 processor and i get 8700 in 3dmark05 and 4600 in 35mark06.

wow thanks for some info. gonna have to look into the opteron a bit as I dont know to much about that chip   also I forgot to add in that the memory chips I have now are 2 gig pc-3200 gold series dual gx xtc 2-3-3-8 from oc


as far as my budget goes, if I can get the mobo,cpuvid card for under 900 I would be happy and then in a few months add in the second geforce for sli  

now to throw in another question on overclocking which would be better too look at the opteron or the dual core 64s?

the opterons beat the crap out of everything as far as overclocking goes, to give you an idea my opty 144 is 1.8 ghz stock, i'm running it at 2.9 ghz on air cooling and it never goes over 46 C under load! that's a 1.1 ghz overclock on air!

hiya all I'm back  

ok I took your advice and this is what I ordered up so far.

mobo with the A64 4200+ dual core "manchester core" I believe.

now my problem is I cant seem to find the vid card anywheres.

I was gonna go with the bfg7900gt but newegg doesnt have it anymore, looked thru pricegrabber,pricewatch and did an internet search with no luck. I keep comming up with the bfg 7800gt.

is there another card that is compairable to the bfg? I figure I have about $350 left over to work with

any more suggestions? I did see a deal for two bfg 7600gt cards for under 400 which I thought about because I could then set up sli now instead of a few months down the road but wasnt sure how much of a loss in game play I would see with the older card.

once again thanks for the help.

Here is another good option:

eVGA Geforce 7900GT 256-P2-N565-AX Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E1681...

I have an EVGA and personally like the brand. I do not overclock and have had zero problems at stock frequency. My card came with two DVI-VGA converters and had good documentation.

I also like the eVGA cards just like TC, I've had 2 and it seems like a good brand

"If not then go for X2 4200+Dual core for maybe $50 bucks more than the 4000+. "

The 4200+ was $357 yesterday....I think the 4000+ is already at or below about the $260 price point, is it not?

"Just keep in mind that if you decide to go cheaper on the processor to make sure to buy one with 1MB of L2 cache and not 512KB."

Given equal prices, I'd choose the larger cache as well, but, at the same frequency (i.e., 4600+ vs 4800+ at 2.4GHz), I really don't feel a larger cache is worth $50-$75 more within the X2 series/model range....

I've said this many times: You can always try to overclock, but you're stuck with a cache size.

TigerDirect has the 7900gt for just over $300.