Bargain Build or Waste for $550?

Rosewill is junk!!!!!!!! Remember, you get what you pay for.

What are the differences in the gpu and hdd that make them fatser/better?

Does the rest of the system look sound for modest overclocking, a bit of gaming? I'm pretty sure it could handle the other neccesities.

I ran a rosewill 500watt on a Q6600, 4gb ram, 2 HDs, 8800gts for over a year and a half before I sold my system and didnt have a single problem. I am running a 750 watt corsair now, I now spend a little more on PSUs just to be safe. But I had a good experience with Rosewill.

Get RAM that runs at its advertised timings on the JEDEC standard 1.8V, like this Mushkin for $66 after MIR: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820146731
If you want to overclock AMD, consider a 790GX chipset board. The integrated GPU may even be enough for "light gaming," but we'd need to know what titles you mean to play. This chipset has some OC features that are missing from earlier chipsets.
I agree with johnyeah on the PSU. One of the Rosewills surprised the guys at jonnyguru.com by passing all their tests with good results, but that one wasn't it, and the brand is generally considered crap.
There's a $40 off bundle on that case with the Antec True Power Trio TP3-650 650W PSU:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817371001
You have selected an IDE optical drive. A SATA one will avoid the airflow-blocking ribbon cable. Most any new mobo will have plenty of SATA ports and cables.
I'm really looking forward to the benchmarks on the new HD4670. That card looks like it might be a great choice for light gaming, and it doesn't need auxilliary power.

Currently it is $554.68. It may change slightly.

I would get this motherboard instead, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131324 (better chipset albeit micro ATX and cheaper by $8 since it has free shipping).

So without changing your budget much, here's what I would get if I was to go AMD:

ASUS M3A78-EM AM2+ 780G Micro ATX
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131324

Antec Three Hundred Black ATX Mid Tower
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6811129042

LG Black 20x DVD-Burner SATA
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6827136149

AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819103773

XIGMATEK 92mm Rifle CPU Cooler
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233001

Western Digital Caviar SE16 640GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6822136218

Mushkin 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2-800
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820146692

Antec EarthWatts 430W
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817371006

EVGA Geforce 9600GSO
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814130356

Here getting the Althon X2 6000+ is actually cheaper, because there's a current Combo Deal with the HDD that counts for $15 off (you could also get the 500GB version if you're on a strict budget limit, but the 640GB is noticeably faster for the extra dollars).

^great builds from jtt283 and johnyeah...if going with jtt283's build, you can actually afford to get a 4850 (a beast of a card)

Well it's Rumored D3 will only run on Direct 9x, which makes sense as they have always chosen on expandability over intense graphics.

Instead of that RAM, I would get http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820146692 which is better and cheaper, you even get a $20 rebate.

Well. There're a number of complaints I've read about Rosewill PSU's, but I've never used them and never tested it so I can't give you any conclusions. Most, if not all, on Tom's recommend against it, and with good reason. I personally don't like taking chances (since I'm usually on the short end of the stick), but there are better ways to save $$ then going cheap on things that're important.

Yeah, I would say the nvidia is kind of a fanboy thing, but in my experience they work out well.

Wow thats a lot of misinformation.

1.) q6600 are not the "best price/performance" considering the games he is looking to play. A Core 2 Duo will smoke the the quads based on value. Maybe if he was looking to do video transcoding or play Supreme Commander then a q6600 would be where he would want to be ...but that wasnt mentioned.

2.) 2:1 ratio of return on ATI dollars over Nvidia? Whos the Fanboy now? ATI didnt become a recommended buy until the 4xxx series cards came out and then TOMs only recommended the 4850 in crossfire as a maximum build. Frankly, the 2:1 price/performance ratio is bogus propganda ......maybe if he was shopping at Radio Shack that would be true....but this is Newegg and their prices reflect the market. We really need to know your monitor size to match a video card for your system.

3.) The Quad AMD chips are significantly faster at most tasks then the dual AMD chips, so it does matter. The black edition only matters if you plan on overclocking the CPU, but considering this is a "budget build" theres no room for the aftermarket cooler that you would need to safely overclock an AMD cpu.

If you reason that he should buy a cooler the cheapest ones with decent preformance are about $40 ...... that would be better spent buying a more expensive CPU like an Intel e7200.

Would it be recommended to go with an intel CPU? Would the cost be significantly higher in the end? My monitor is a 17" widescreen, and are ATI or Nvidia's recommended?

I'd still get the Earthwatts 430W over the Basiq, Antec best PSUs are TruePower Quattro, NeoPower, and Earthwatts series in that order, the rest are okay, but I wouldn't put them in my system, I prefer higher quality over saving a measly $10-15.

As far as GPU goes, If you're absolutely adamant about not spending more than $100, then get something along the lines of this:

MSI R4670-2D512 Radeon HD 4670 512MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814127383

However, if you can be a little more flexible and spend a little more (which I strongly suggest you do) then get this:

PALiT XAE/48500+T352 Radeon HD 4850 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814261027

Then I suggest you get the HD 4850, you'll probably end up setting an altar to thank me for this later on, it's probably the best decision you'll make on that build... I know it because I have one and I know how good it is.

Well no, I have a Sapphire HD 4850 Dual Slot Edition not the Palit one, but it's basically the same thing just a different bundle. (Mine comes with a different cooler, HDMI-DVI Adapter, and Crossfire bridge)

EDIT: Or are you referring about which card to get? If that's the question, then yes I meant to get the HD 4850.

I hate to say it, but that would put me over budget by quite a bit.

$553, Intel Build / e5200 / 9800GT with CoD4 free.

http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/ [...] er=8533851

The build has a few rebates (which makes it less than 550 if you count them), and you should be able to overclock the hell out of this processor. Some people are getting over 3ghz on stock volts, others are reaching 4ghz with a nice heatsink. The other stuff included in the build is pretty nice, though I'm not sure if you need an OS disk or not. 2GB of Ram is fine, I can tell you in my gaming experiences, I've never seen my memory usage from a game use over a single Gig of Ram. I dunno how Vista will fair in this field though, 'cause I use XP on my system. The 9800GT (8800GT) isn't really much slower than the 4850, it'll save you some money, and you get a killer free game to boot.

I didn't really see any builds going the direction I went with my part selections. Any thoughts?

Kax, I came here with a HTPC/photo-editing PC in mind with slight gaming and general computing. Kind of a melting pot of goals and there were a lot of of options and some great advice. My initial hardware budget was $600-700 as far as hardware goes. A lot of suggestions went well over that. Which is cool, but I have other priorities for my money which I consider more important. Work always comes before play for me. So, I cut some corners, and there isn't anything wrong about that. You can ALWAYS upgrade later. Just pulling for you as I don't think you can go wrong with any of these builds. Just because you can't get 65 FPS in Crysis doesn't mean you're not spending enough. 30, is plenty.

If you started with my build, you could use the 4850 that emp suggested. I'd prefer Earthwatts over Basiq myself, but the Basiq should be enough.

Well, the top media device is would require a SATA cable. The second link proved to be a deactivated item and just brought up a list of other HDD's, the very top one, also being SATA. Just look for it in the item description, it will either read as SATA or IDE/PATA.

Uhm, yes, you'll have power cables from your PSU that are able to power sata devices. Your HD or mobo will come with sata cables.

The hard drive and the cd-rom are both OEM.