[kalanikaau]

First time builder here, looking for a system that will primarily used to surf the net, some digital photography and word processing, practically no gaming.Speed is of the essence for me.....I currently use a cable modem, but I might switch to WiMax ( Clearwire ) soon.I do a very limited amount of dvd ripping and burning now, but may want to get into it later.As a 1st time builder I want a system that will be somewhat up to date a couple of years down the road, but at the same time on a budget.Am just interested in the tower for now, I already have a Dell 24" widescreen monitor that Isuspect my present system just is not doing any justice, as well as other periferals (sic)Can anyone offer any insight as to case size, processor type and speed, mobo, RAM, hard drive capacity (should I RAID), etc??Plan to run Vista on this system,Any insight is much appreciated......

[techie4fun]

Welcome to PC World 8)We'll, to start, your probably going to want a motherboard that supports at least up to 2 gigs or more of RAM, as down the road when/if you do upgrade to Vista, you'll need at least 2 gigs to enjoy running the OS. You would want a fairly fast processor, I wouldn't be investing in an Intel Core Duo 2, they're overpriced right now and I'd probably kick the notch down to an AMD 64 single core that'll cost around $75 at newegg. If you would like to spend more, go for a little over $100, I'd say to about $120 and you can get an dual core MINI AMD that'll be your babe for life.Here are just a few low priced processors I picked randomly. AMD Athlon 64 3200 Orleans 2.0GHz with AM2 sockethttp://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103637 AMD Athlon 64 3000 1.81 GHz AM2 socket.http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103639 AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ with AM2 sockethttp://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103735As for ram... find something you like and go with it. I'd definitely invest in a SATA Hard drive with at least 200 gigabytes of space.

[kalanikaau]

thanks Techie for the advice,I forgot to mention power supply and video cardSystem I have now is about 5 yrs. old, Pentuim 4 processor with a vid card that shares some memory (I think....lol), read that I should get a way from that type of setup, what so you good folks think??