I am on a small budget but so far these are the components I am thinking of: Motherboard - ASUS A7N8-E Deluxe CPU - FSB 333Mhz Athlon Athlon XP 2700+ (2167 Mhz) Sound Card - Audidgy 2 ZS DVD Burner - Plextor PX-712A Windows XP Pro Still looking for (need suggestions please?): Graphic Card (to play Sims 2) RAM Case Is the set up I picked good? Any bad points? Is it all compatable? Any other low budget suggestions or changes? I mainly use my computer for the internet<----(this is the most important max internet speed possible is needed), photo and video editing with occasional gaming. I do alot of stuff at once like burning, photo editing, and surfing. So does this set up match well to my needs?

Steven, Nice name! Heh. :) Yeah those components look pretty decent. The sound card you picked out is (from what I am told) pretty sweet. I also have the AMD Athlon XP 2700+ (2.17 GHz) and it's never given me any problems - you shouldn't have any problems with it either. How much memory are you planning to put in that system? I'd suggest two sticks of 512MB PC2700 RAM. That'd be 1GB of RAM total. AMD Athlon XP 2700+ with 1GB of RAM = FAST! That will just about cover all of your bases, internet, photo editing, whatever! :) - Steven

I was thinking of two sticks on 512MB but I don't know which BUDGET make is best? Is there much difference in speed between 2700+ the 3000+ and the AMD 64 2600+? I heard Pentium 4 is better for photo & video editing (why is this?) but it cost alot more than AMD and the specs seem slower. Has anyone got suggestions for a case and budget (good) graphic card? Finally the most important is top internet speeds (because of my job) anything to improve that?

The P4s deep pipeline is really suited to repetitive work on multiple data. To make a change to every pixel on a photo is that kind of work. The AMD with a shorter pipeline can recover faster when an unexpected instruction comes along. Such as moving your mouse or pressing a button. This makes the AMD more suited to gaming or even office type work. In order to get top internet performance, I recommend something faster than a 486. Cases are very much a personal choice. You'll be looking at it every day. Did you forget about a hard drive?

www.newegg.com Search for 'MSI GeForce FX5900XT' About $200, I believe? It's not a top of the line video card but it's not too shabby either. It's a popular card. I use it in my computer, no problems! :) As of what processor to go with, I can almost guarantee you that an AMD Athlon XP 2700+ and 1GB of RAM (2 sticks of 512MB) will be FAST! lol. Really any brand of RAM will do, they're all in the same price range for the most part, Crucial is a good brand (I use their PC2700 512MB sticks). I really don't know how you'd be able to improve your internet speed though. Sorry. Hope I was of some help. :)