Hi,
I've decided on building a new base unit around the E8400 and just thought I'd tap in to the hive mind of the TH members to fit good components around it. Here's where I'm at in my thinking.

I want to OC the chip to a comfortable level (maybe 4.0) but have no real OC experience. I know that I need to up voltages on the board and memory to keep a 1:1 and if I can find a board that will make that process pretty automatic and painless then so much the better. I definitely don't want to go crazy with the OCing and don't want to pay the earth for a mb with feature I'm not going to use. I've seen the Gigabyte P35-DQ6 bandied about, is this a suitable board?

I'm probably going to put one of the 4800s in there too, but have no desire to go multi-card.

I want to put 4GB of DDR2 in. What do you recommend? It seems many people go for good quality 800s that will have tight timings and the head room to clock up.

3rd party CPU cooler. I know little about these, my current Athlon XP2600 didn't really them!! Again trying to pick up scraps on forums, I've heard Arctic 7 mentioned. Any other suggestion based on my needs. I don't want to be paying crazy money for one of these either.

Hard drive. I see some set-up using Raptors presumably as the OS/App drive then a more standard drive for data. With latest generation HDs upping the throughput and burst rate, has the benefit of doing this dwindled in relation to the extra cost?

PSU. As you can tell from my current CPU I don't really upgrade (I won't tell you what the rest of the system is, you'll only laugh), so although I want a quality supply I don't need it to have any extra headroom in terms of wattage. Suggestions please?

I look forward to your feedback

ok, I've done a bit more scouring and I'm thinking about these bits. Any comments? (all sourced from Ebuyer)

MB - Gigabyte EP35C-DS3R. The only difference between this and the non 'c' version is it supports both DDR2 and DDR3 and only costs a quid more. £75.98

Cooler - AC-FRZ-7P £15.98

PSU - Hi-Power Black 700w £39.99

Ram - Corsair 2x2GB XMS DHX (4-4-4-12) £72.85

GPU - Sapphire 4850 512MB - £123

Nice ram, for the cooler i suggest xigmatek s1283 and for the psu i suggest corsair 550w or any other good brand around 500-600w.

build you system off the gpu, then choose the mobo, then the right psu

if you have 100w gpu or 2 x 250w, your psu is the difference between a 600w psu and 1000w psu

i size a psu at 50-60% of total load - you have room to add and your in the most effecient, energy sweet spot.

Someone said the mixed DDR boards have issues, but regardless I would consider an ASUS P5Q. P45 may be getting mixed reviews, but they are very OC friendly, and I think you'll save some cash