Intel Core2 Quad Q6600 it has 8mb of L2 cache. I remember when L2 lived on the mobo.

I am only running 2gb of ram because board only supports DDR2 667 and 800, the other 2 gb (I picked up last year when I first thought I needed to upgrade) is DDR2 533 so far no problems. I need a power supply before I need more ram I think.

Yeah if you have a pretty intense graphics card, you definitely need a good powersupply to accomodate the needed power. I purchased a GeForce 7600 GT last year and it requred a +12 volt current rating of 18 amps. I still have the same Antec server case we purchased at Staples!! LOL

Yeah, I purchased a Radeon HD 2900 XT which requires at least a 550 Watt supply (750 watts if you want crossfire). The thing is huge; it practically goes the length of my entire motherboard. Pumps some monster graphics; though side effects include a loud fan, excess heats, and of course the high electric bill.

haha that reminds me. A friend of mine was building a computer and his new graphics card was so big, that it wouldn't fit (memory was in the way). LOL

Since you guys are gonna turn this into a nerd thread just what kinda graphics require a mega graphics card? Is it for gaming or something? I have a cheepie 256 MB Geforce something that seems to work fine for the basic crap I do. Even the one connected to my 52" plasma seems to be fine. What exactly am I missing?

Well I'm a heavy gamer. So I needed to put the emphasis on my GPU to do gaming as opposed to like 6 or 8 gigs of memory to do some heavy processing. Likewise there are some different constructions of video cards for different purposes; people that need to do some heavy modeling and rendering in 3D applications or display on multiple huge monitors might need to spend in excess of a thousand dollars on a single card (and depending on how many monitors you're displaying you might need multiple cards) while in video games, that same card might not do as much as a gamer card that costs half as much.

Likewise, if you want to support HD resolutions even on large televisions, that would require a video card that supports that, such as Radeon's new HD series.

Well, my crappy WalMart 32" died Wed. So I'm gonna be replacing it with another 50" HP if my warranty pays off. We'll see if it requires more graphic processing. The one in the living room seems fine with the light browsing I do in there, but this one will be my "main" setup, so it'll get more use. We'll see how it works out.

By the way, don't buy the crappy Polaroid tv's WalMart has. They have an AWESOME picture, but they are crap. Luckily I used my Mastercard and they are replacing it. Another bit of advice, buy everything with a AMEX, MC or Visa. They double any warranty up to 1 year.

Haha, yeah. I actually couldn't use my newer and better looking case because it literally wouldn't fit the graphics card and necessary power supply. I had to trade my brother for his old huge beat-up looking Antec lanboy case that essentially looks like a big grey box with its cover missing and the side handle broken off. Though it doesn't look like it from the outside, it's a top of the line computer inside. My computer's name over my network is "the sleeper" .

Since I wanted to test drive vista, and didn't want to trash my install of XP, I am using the case from my dad's old computer (it was the only one with the extra 2x2 12v power connector for the processor) 350 watts means on board video (which happens too be the intel 3100 something or other I am sure gaming would be painful but aero doesn't seem to mind it) one hard drive one optical drive and no case fans. I can't say anything bad about vista yet... the only hiccup was installing the chipset drivers killed the ide controller which meant it couldn't finish installing the drivers off the cd. ahd to finish install off USB flash drive hehe a 4gb floppy.

haha my cover is also broken off..