Advice/Comments/Suggestions on New System.

[kenr77]

I've been researching MBs and trying to get myself up to Speed on new technology, chipsets ...ect.. for the last 2 weeks. Yet I am still having trouble making up my mind.

I was going to go with integrated graphics at first and still may. But I think my best choice right now is a BioStar TForce 550 MB. the only thing it doesn't have that I think would be nice is hardware support for TCP/IP acceleration.

So Far... TForce 550 --- seems to be a good OverClocker
Athlon 64 X2 3600+
DDR2-800 1GB
Cheap PCIe x16 GPU

I have been trying to find 1 or 2 sites that have an exstensive, detailed and easy to use comparison guide of MBs and/or chipsets, but have not found any that cover a wide breadth of manufacturers.

Any suggestions for Mobo or sites that give good chipset comparisons, would be helpful. Any suggestions for chipset selection.? Should I wait a little while yet for some new chipset or new MB support for AMD K10..??

Thanks, kenr77

 

[g-paw]

Usually I check the reviews on this site and extremetech.com and Google reviews of a particular mobo, which will usually bring comparison articles. The first question is, what is you budget? I believe Intel will becoming out with the Quad Core next quarter and AMD next year. Regardless, the new stuff will be really expensive for a couple months. My rule of thumb is that if my budget for a machine is around $700 to $800 or less for everything except the monitor and no OS if it's a replacement machine, or up to $900 with an OS, I go with AMD. If I can go upwards of a $1000, then Intel. You can do an Intel for less than $700 but most of what I've read suggest more bang for the buck with AMD