Hi. I'm in the market of looking for a new system. My last custom, budget-friendly computer was a Athlon XP 2400+-based system housed in a humungous tower; currently, I'm using a Pentium M laptop given as a gift. Now I'm considering building a small-profile desktop such as the FragBox or Shuttle systems. My budget is $1000 cap.

FYI, this computer will be mainly used as a workstation and a portal to watch HDTV (I already own a USB tuner). Not too much gaming or video editing.

Here's what I'm considering so far:

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+(65W) Windsor 2.2GHz Socket AM2 Processor Model ADO4200CUBOX - Retail
Thermaltake VF1000BNS Black Aluminum Front Panel/ SECC Chassis MicroATX Desktop Computer Case - Retail
G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-6400CL5D-2GBNQ - Retail
RAIDMAX RX-530A ATX12V / EPS12V 530W Power Supply - Retail
ABIT NF-M2 nView Socket AM2 NVIDIA GeForce 6150 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail

Overclocking isn't a real big issue for me, but I would like to push my system to its limits when it nears its death . What do you guys/gals think? Is this a good buy or should I wait a little longer with the quad-cores? I chose AMD because I found the CPU and mobo to be significantly cheaper than the Intel CPU and mobo that I am eyeing (E6600 and P5B-VM). Anyway, I am open to suggestions and recommendations. Thanks!

any c2d system will out perform your amd system you came up. whats all in your $1000 budget, do you need hard drives, monitor, etc, stuff you didnt list? i assume you plan on using a micro ATX mobo. also if you wait a little bit intel is dropping their prices.

i already have a monitor, keyboard+mouse, and hard drives to spare (IDE), but I can probably find some great deals on SATA HDDs from fw. what c2d should i consider purchasing? also, are there mATX mobos that are similar to the abit nview? (decent onboard graphics for HDTV, optical out audio, etc.) thanks for the suggestions.

Get a better quality PSU.

for the cpu, e6300. as for the motherboard i dont know what to tell you, i couldnt find anything that specific

This board looks promising:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813121066

However, it's a picoBTX form factor and I'm not very familiar with it and its available cases. Are there "cube" cases for picoBTX mobos? the specs look very promising tho and it has VGA + DVI outputs, along with optical out.

i googled it and came up with a some small form factor cases. check it out, its not easy finding a case like the one you were originally looking at. shuttle makes a picoBTX computer link other than that the only thing i could find was this link

So I hit the drawing board once again, and here's what I have:

GIGABYTE GA-965GM-S2 LGA 775 Intel G965 Express Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail $109
Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 Allendale 1.8GHz LGA 775 Processor Model BX80557E4300 - Retail $189
G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-6400CL5D-2GBNQ - Retail $204
Antec NeoPower NeoHE 550 ATX12V 550W Power Supply - Retail $109
MadDog 16X DVD±R DVD Burner With 5X DVD-RAM Write Black IDE Model MD-16X3DVD9-8X - OEM $26
Ultra MicroFly Blue mATX Cube Case (saw this on frys for cheap) $40 AR
plus a SATA HDD 500GB that I can probably find for $130 or so.

Quick question about the power supply. The Gigabyte mobo has a 24-pin, but the Antec PSU is 20+4 pin; are they compatible?

The total comes around $800 which I am very satisfied with and leaves me room to purchase a DX10 card when they come out (with HDMI output), a better sound card, or a better tv tuner (cable/satellite/hdtv).

looks good, everything is fine

IMHO, I think you need an HDCP compatible video card to watch HD content routed through the PC. This is an article you might consider researching, regarding playback of HD content, before you finalize your graphics solution.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] i=2886&p=1

Thanks for the heads-up. Is an HDCP compatible video card necessary if I am just watching OTA/satellite HD? From what I understood from the reading, having an HDCP compatible card only applies when watching Blu-Ray or HD-DVD movies. I'll consider getting a player once prices go lower =).

I wish this Gigabyte board and the P5B-VM board had DVI-out .