Dude, if you sincerely think you have to spend the kind of money you are to get a good system, but not bleeding edge, I hate to break this to you - this is a bleeding edge system! It may not be tip-top of the line, but it might as well be. Look at benchmarks of the CPU's... http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20041221/cpu_charts-16.html 1280x1024 Far Cry, and the difference between a 3500 Athlon 64 and the 3800 is 184fps to 192. You can't tell the difference! Let's look at price now... Using newegg it's $260 vs. $367. That's worth $107? In my opinion, absolutely not, but that's your call. Personally, I'd get a 3000 or a 3200 on a motherboard that can take an FX-55, and upgrade when the FX-55 is dirt cheap in a year or so. Going down the line, you're getting way more than you need on almost every component. Why do you need a platinum or a plantinum pro on your sound card, period? I understand getting an Audigy 2, but how about the one without all the interconnects. Are you seriously going to be connecting fiber optic audio devices to record from? That's fine if you are, but most people aren't. That's around $100 more right there! You don't need two gigs of memory. 1 gig? Absolutely! Even buying CAS2 I kinda understand. 2 gigs is overkill. 1 gig of CAS 2.5 PC3200 RAM is $80 shipped right now. Yours I'm guessing is what - $300? That's $220 right there... You don't need a Lian Li case, but you probably knew that. You don't need that heatsink unless you're gonna overclock, which you don't have to do with a rig that highly spec'ed. That's $40... You don't need a 6800GT, but I understand if you want a screaming rig. But nevertheless, a 6600GT will perform very well in every game out there. But of all the components, the 6800GT should be cut down last. You don't need RAID. A fast SATA drive with tons of capacity will do great for gaming, and has half the chance of data loss. Pop a 250 gig SATA in there, and forget 2x160 gigs in RAID0. RAID0 will get you NO higher frame rates in your games! Do you really care if it takes 20 seconds to load a level instead of 30 (and having to double the risk as I mentioned in the process)? That's about $100 right there... All those suggestions aside from the video card (keep it...you might actually see the performance increase from that), I just saved you $600! And trust me, your rig will still be slamming! For the RAID setup, read the article. NCQ is Seagate's term for the technology. Other brands have the same tech, but it's not called the same thing. Irregardless, the point is you have to turn it off in the drivers for now. No, I would not trade the Seagate drivers for WD's; Seagate drives are much better quality. If you do run RAID0, I highly suggest you buy an external hard drive, and use XP Pro instead of Home, so you have NTBackup to easily backup your system. Running RAID0 without frequent backups is like the coyote from Loony Toons strapping the Acme rocket to his back. It will be fast, but it didn't turn out too well for the coyote, and neither will it for all your data. Bottom line is even tip top systems are dusted in 2 years by newer systems. Save that money for constant reasonably priced upgrades. "People! Take to the streets and scream, 'BE REASONABLE!!!'"

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good logic, and reasoning there hero. A couple of hundred dollars more to gain a few extra frames a second is not penny wise, and is not gonna make or break game play experience. A 3k system can be classifeid as a weapon of mass destruction, and if I had that kind of money to invest in my machine I would not even bother posting, muchless care for other opinions (except, which part is the fastest available to the public), but hey, to each their own. Happy spending and happy fragging. abit is7 i856pe Prescott 2.8ghz @ 4004Mhz 286x14 FSB @ 1144Mhz 512x2 in dual config @ 430mhz 9800 se unlocked & clocked @ 444mhz/800mhz

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i might not know much about computers but to me thats alot of overkill and id do what heropsycho says save the money for good upgrades 1-5 frames per second ant gonna make much difference... And flashy keyboard for that price... you must be hell rich or hell madd if you spend that much on a system at once im guessing your just madd on games. Intel Celeron 325 2.5ghz 256mb ram On-board graphic soon to be upgraded. 40gb seagate HDD

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"I don't want a state-of-the-art gaming PC, but I do want a PC that will preform very good with today's latest games. I am buying everything new, monitor, mouse, keyboard etc... Are these good parts for the money?" "Are these good? Am I being ripped off? It totalls to about $2800, is that to much?" Hey, you chose the parts so how could you be getting ripped off? It's definitely overkill & whether you think so or not, it's damn close to leading edge. But it seems to me you're paying an awfully lot of money for things you don't really need to spend so much on: 1. $210 on soundcard 2. $230 on PSU 3. $135 on case 4. $190 on 1GB (2 x 512) PC3200 5. $45 on a mouse 6. $50 on keyboard 7. $85 on heatsink + fan + adapter 8. $290 on speakers Total of $1235! You should be able to knock off $800 from the above. Asus A7N8X-X 1800+ @ 8 x 210MHz 768MB PC3200 Asus A9550 128MB/128-bit Gamer Edition WinME/WinXP Pro

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Don't want to pee on your bonfire or anything, but remember that that system is overkill now, but give it another year when Microsoft Windows Longhorn is out, the next generation DirectX, SATA2 and Multi-core processors, your suggested computer will be average. In my view, it would be better to spend money on a good mid-to-high end computer using sensibly priced stuff and upgrade as it needs it. AMD Athlon XP2200+ Aero7 lite 1GB Crucial pc2700 Abit NF7-s V2.0 80GB Seagate SATA 120GB Seagate SATA Geforce4 Ti4200 128mb Benq FP767-12 17" 12ms SB Audigy 2 ZS

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Yes but he will probably never need all that to run any game. He doesn't need a top of the line sound card. And an $85 keyboard? Man I would seriously shop around for better deals.

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Umm, sorry to break it to you, the keyboard is $45... And I have decided to get an Audigy 2 ZS Gamer LE instead.

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I don't agree with many of your hardware choices, but hey, if you can afford it, knock yourself out. I think Snoopy104 nailed it: "it would be better to spend money on a good mid-to-high end computer using sensibly priced stuff and upgrade as it needs it" Asus A7N8X-X 1800+ @ 8 x 210MHz 768MB PC3200 Asus A9550 128MB/128-bit Gamer Edition WinME/WinXP Pro

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In my experence in cpu buliding that is way too much for what you are getting. Try going to other websites to look for parts. I always buy off of TigerDirect.com

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