I've just put together my second computer with a budget of $600.00. $100 of that was for shiping (yes I was in a hurry for the parts). Anyway, everything worked great right out of the boxes. Athlon 64 x2 4800+ (65nm) 2.5 ghz Biostar TF7050-M2 AM2 EVGA 7600 GT, 256 mb CORSAIR XMS2 1GB (2 x 512MB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel WD SE WD1200JS 120GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 500 watt power supply (and the rest I had, mouse, keyboard, Monitor) Well, everything works great. My only complaint is Sandra's Cache and Memory Test. How come a 3800+ w/ 1 gig of pc3200 (400mhz) is par with my computer. I would have thought that I should have beet that benchmark. I have the Pc6400 set at 800 Mhz. Is there a bottle neck somewhere? Can I adjust my bios for better performance? Change Windows setting? Also, I scored Well on most the other tests . And, I have all driver's up to date.

Setup a performance monitor in xp to see what may be causing this. I read it wrong and answer it wrong too. So get off my case you goober.

Optimize the system first: http://www.tweakguides.com/files/TG... Both CPUs have the same cache specs.

When it comes to memory tests, there's not a huge performance difference between an AM2 system w/DDR2-800 vs a S939 system with DDR400. http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu.h... Since you're not using the onboard graphics, I'm a bit confused by the motherboard choice, not to mention 'wasting' $100 on shipping. And the premium you paid for XMS RAM was unnecessary. I would have put that money toward a better board (nForce 570 Ultra) & 2GB RAM (2 x 1GB) & just waited a few more days for shipping.