OK, for all you motherboard and gamer guru's.

Here's the story:

I currently have celeron 500mhz running on a Abit BM6 motherboard, with 256 (pc66) sdram, GeForce 2 GTS 32mb, SB Live! Value, and a 20gig maxtor 5400 HD.

Ok, now stop laughing.

I'm ready to upgrade. But, unlike my history of buying computers and not knowing exactly what I'm getting, I've come along way in my personal knowledge of whats 'best' and 'useful' for me.

I'm a gamer, and I code. Mostly gamer though (heh), so I need some advice.

I'm stuck between buying a P4 (1.8a or 2.0 around there) or an AMD Athlon 1900XP or 2000XP.

But along those lines, I need to pick a good motherboard.

I've decided on the MSI 845Gmax for the P4 board and the Asus A7V333 board for the AMD.

I'm considering using RAID, but would like to know how much that's going to effect my gaming (in both good and bad ways). I believe I might benefit the most from Raid Striping (I believe that is where data is written half to one drive and half to the other?)

So here's where you come in,
What most gamers these days using for the better performance, yet allowing for a stable environment?

Is RAID worth it?
Will I have trouble transfering my RAID Array to another motherboard if I wish to upgarde in the future?

Are there any advantages or disadvantages to the boards that I mentioned, or CPU's? Comparing the AMD boards, is the KT3 Ultra and the A7V333 fairly comparable, and which one would offer the best performance while still offering the extra stuff like RAID and USB 2.0?

I'm not looking to spend a whole lot of money, so money is an issue. But I don't want to do the half-way upgrade that I've been known to do before (sorta like buying a celeron 1.7 rather than a P4 1.7... if you get the idea, I'd rather go all the way up to P4)




Here are some of the games that I currently play (or would like to be able to play, heh):

World War II Online
DAOC
Shadowbane
-- Pretty much any MMORPG...I'm a big fan of those

Also, some of the new games, like Morrowind and the new Unreal Tournament.

And of course I'm a big fan of CS, but I've had no problems playing that with my current system.



Thanks in advance to any replies I get. I appreciate your help.



-Landshark