I find for the price/performance ratio, AMD CPU's are hard to beat. I picked up the 955 black edition for cheap a while back (quad core). While the i7's are faster in some select apps and scenarios, I don't think the real-world difference justifies the extra cost (of the CPU and associated mobos).

As far as motherboards, I've almost always stuck with Asus.

Memory - I've used cheap and expensive and found no difference. I think it's all from the same source.

Antec for power supplies.

For video both nVidia and ATi make excellent cards - they are constantly one-upping each other. I just bought a Radeon 5870, beast of a card, barely fit into my tower.

It's incredible the rate at which graphics processing has increased.

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Chris
2007 E550 4Matic - 61,000 Km - Iridium Silver, black leather, Sport package, Premium 2 package
2007 GL450 4Matic - 62,000 Km - Obsidian Black Metallic, black leather, all options
1998 E430 - sold
1989 300E - 333,000 Km - sold
1977 280E - sold
1971 250 - retired

"And a frign hat. They gave me a hat at the annual benefits meeting. I said. how does this benefit me. I dont have anything from the company.. So they gave me a hat." - TheDon