Hello, Bought a s---ty deal, not knowing in a few months I would get into 3-D intense Graphic Gaming. Now I am forced to have to build my own. I think I could tackle it but I do not know anything about MoBoards or Processors exept that they are the most important things of a PC. The rest I can handle. I am currently looking at 2 MoBoard: http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=VNF4-ULTRA-N&cat=MBB AND http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-128-268&depa=0 I like both of them and their prices however I do not know which would be better or a better one to have PCI Express, because I know in a year or 2 PCIe will be one of the only options. Also could someone try to explain what Slots,Ports,IDE,SATA,Onboard Audio,Onboard Lan,Onboard IEEE1394,Form Factor they are usually under the Specs on Most motherboards. And I dont have a clue what they are. HELP! ****ALSO*** As far as CPUs go I no what kind I want that being and AMD Athlon 64 939 Socket PCIe, but I don't no the good kinds that are good deals because I have absoutely no experience with them since I have been buying manufactored computers so far in my life. **I cannot find a good AMD Athlin 64 (w/ PCIe capatible). THANKS EVERYONE

Pls don't double post, it may cause one or both of your posts to be removed. B4 you criticize a bigger man, walk a mile in his shoes. That way, you're a mile away, and you have his shoes.

You want to get an SLI motherboard Tt Lanfire nf7-s v2.0 XP-m 2500@209x11 SP 97 512mb pc3200 Jou Jye 550w psu FX5600 WDCaviar 160gb sata WDCaviar 160gb sata ;~}

I think I can answer your questions about the slots, ports, etc. I'll be short and very basic about the terms. Slots are expansion slots(like PCI & PCIe[white], and AGP[grey])on your mobo where you put add-in cards. Ports are normally refering to the ports on the back of the add-in cards(like VGA of S-Video out on a graphics card) or USB, PS/2(KB & mouse). IDE is the standard for hard drives and CDROM drives for plugging into the mobo via an IDE data cable. ATA is the interface standard between IDE devices and the mobo. Until a few years ago, all ATA devices were PATA(parallel ATA), which means that the data was sent in chunks or pulses, if you will. And the majority of hard drives still use PATA. However, SATA (serial ATA) sends data in a flow of one bit at a time in a constant flow; which means that the data can travel through a smaller cable, and at somewhat faster speeds. Onboard audio is sound by the mobo's chipset, therefore not needing an add-in sound card. Some people don't like it because sometimes the sound isn't as good as a sound card, but it can sound good, and it saves money. The nForce series chipsets have great sound BTW. Onboard LAN can be ok, because it saves you from having to buy an add-in card. But it bums off the mobo, like the onboard audio, slowing it down a tad, but not enough to matter IMO. IEEE1394 is another term for FireWire, the difference is that the term FireWire is(I think)copywrited by Apple, so PCs have to use the longer, technical word. It's rather expensive, so it'll increase the price of the mobo, but it's fast. However, USB is catching up with it, speed wise, so FireWire may go out of popularity. Form factor is kind of like the size of your mobo. When you look at mobos and cases, make sure that the case supports the form factor of the mobo. There are 3- AT, ATX, and MicroATX. AT is, I'd say, obsolete. The old pentiums and IBMs from the early and mid 90s used that standard for a long time, but no more. ATX is the modern standard and is the most widely supported. So look for a mobo that is ATX. MicroATX, as its name infers, is a smaller ATX. I don't like them because they're hard to install components on and look silly in normal and large size cases. And most of the time they're not the fastest. But if you like saving space, sure- get a MicroATX. Sorry, I made it as short as I could, but that's it! Hope I helped.

good depends on $$$ you want to spend.baseline would be amd 64 3000 (939) and i like the neo4/sli from msi.only thing with that mobo is its sli video only so you may need a new graphics card.nvida and ati make low end/medium and high end sli cards.all depends on the $$ you want to spend Win Xp .Amd 64 3000.neo2 platinuim.1gig ddr 400