OK guys, if money was (almost!) no object, what would yours be?

AMD or Intel?

ATI or Nvidia?

PCIexpress or AGP?

Basically I'm looking to build a new high end PC, but I'd LIKE a bit of info from you learned peeps on compatibility issues etc you may have heard of. Does ATI work better with AMd for instance? :-/

I'll be using it MAINLY for music recording and gaming - I have the SOUNDCARD I want in MIND, but am unsure about pretty much everything else! Whats the best gear about?

Also if anyone KNOWS about hard drives - is SATA2 3gb that much better then 1.5gb? I read some tests that didn't look much different.

A word about overclocking - I dont think I'll go down this route, it seems a little risky and potentially expensive if something blows up! How are your experiences with it and how does it affect the gear mentioned?

You dont have to answer all the questions in there! Just anything you know or have heard would be GREATLY appreciated. Collectively a little bit of expertise from all of you should provide a very helpful thread to more then just me I reckon!

Thanks in advance! You really oiught to use your google button, but:

AMD or Intel? Toss up.

aTI or nVidia? Toss up.

AGP or PCIe? PCIe is newer and AGP is a fading technology.

Basing around a sound card is an unusual approach, but oh well.

SATA is evolving and 3 is a newer version. Everything is going that way. That's 'progress'.

Overclocking? I would never recommend this. If an X2 4000+ Processor is not fast enough, you have other issues.

The main issues are your budget and your purpose. We don't know your budget.




Like I said, imagine money not really being an issue - by this I mean I could buy the top consumer stuff, not NASA computer parts!

The AMD/Intel and ATI/Nvidia comparison I really meant for compatibility issues, like ATI having less problems with AMD then it would with Intel, but I guess it's just not that simple huh?

I'll do a bit more 'googling' then and see if I can get a picture of the general concensus that way.

Cheers!