Please Help, need some last min advice b4 purchase

[OaktownHero]

Hey, first off, thanks for checking out my post, I hope you can help me with my problem.
I'm building a new system and I have everything selected I'm going with a C2D system on the Socket T type boards, and I'm going to go with an ATI card, X1900XT w/ crossfire capability, but my questions where these,
while I am not going to crossfire right away, I want a board that can do that, Do I really have to buy the Asus P5W DH, which is certified by ATI for CF, or can the Asus P5B which is $40.00 cheaper, and has 2 PCI:E x16 slots handle it? Also, Do I really have to buy CF certified memory? Up untill I checked the website for CF compatible boards I didn't even know you needed CF capable ram as well. Also, if I went with the P5W DH, do I need to buy DDR2 800 , or is there another cheaper option, that won't really sacrifice performance? the current "CF capable Ram" I'm looking at is by patriot with 4-4-4-12 timings, the 2x1gb DDR2 pc 6400 ram is like $304.00 before a $40.00 MIR, which.. is a MIR so who knows when I'll see that cash again.

So thanks any info would help, even other reccomendations on my system build. BTW, my overall budget is 1,500 so I tried to cut other component costs without sacrificing performance.. My case costs 39 bucks Lol

 

[Mex]

SLI/XFire certified RAM is a marketing gimmick, and you almost fell for it. Don't worry about having certified RAM. Fore the Core 2 Duo, you could get by with DDR2-533 if you needed to, but that will leave you little room for overclocking (If you planned to do that). You could use DDR2-667 if you plan to do some casual OCing, but DDR2-800 is needed to attain the highest possible overclock.

 

[OaktownHero]

Thanks! I thought something might have been up, but as you can tell they had me pretty much sold, That takes care of my RAM issues, jesus.. that Patriot ram was .. well I could afford it, but I didn't really want to blow more cash on my ram than my CPU, (C2D 6400, possibly 6300 then OC) But Now if anyone can answer the questions I had about the MOBO, Thanks a lot for your help. I'm headed out to the gym to clear my head, then when I get back I'm going to check this posting, and if its all good, I'm ordering tonight! Gonna get that system up before college starts on Monday.