Aug 18, 2006
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    http://techreport.com/reviews/2006q3/core2/index.x?pg=18

    http://www.anandtech.com/guides/
    http://arstechnica.com/guides/buyer/system-guide-200608.ars

    http://pricewatch.com/
    http://labs.anandtech.com/cats.php


Case        $100-$150
CPU+MB      $300-$400           ~core 2
RAM         $150-$300           2x1GB DDR2-533 (or 4GB?)
HDD         $150-$300           1.5Gbps SATA
GPU         (later, once DX10 is out, but maybe...  ~$50 now, ~$250-350 later)







CPU
    Intel Core2 Duo E6400 or E6600 or E6700 
        ==> 1066 FSB
        ==> Socket T
        ==> PC2-8500 DDR2-1066 RAM

        E6400 vs E6600....
            (E6400 ftw)  http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=28&threadid=1917594
            (E6400 ftw)  http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1085381

Motherboard
    Crap....  none support AGP, PCI-E only?  So, either I have to upgrade my graphics card now (and miss out on DX10, and possibly on later HDCP cards), or go for a really cheap GPU and maybe not play games for now?

    The one suggested by Ars is (Asus P5B Deluxe WiFi-AP) out of stock for a few days...  here are some potentially similar ones (IF having two PCIE x16's is desirable...  otherwise I could go for a cheaper MB)
        http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?Submit=ENE&N=2010200280+1073607588+1072507541+1074007596+1070509908+1074907612&Subcategory=280&description=&srchInDesc=&minPrice=&maxPrice=

Case
    Possibly a REALLY BIG power supply?  heh.  http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/07/21/the_graphics_state_of_the_union/page2.html

    HTPC cases that look nice...
        
                        SILVERSTONE LASCALA SST-LC14, black
                        LIAN LI PC-V880B 
            $89 noPSU   http://www.pcalchemy.com/product_info.php/pName/ahanix-d5-htpc-case-no-vfd-no-psu-black/cName/htpc-cases
            $89 noPSU   http://www.pcalchemy.com/product_info.php/pName/silverstone-lascala-sstlc10-htpc-case-black/cName/htpc-cases
            

RAM
    2x1GB, DDR-533
        http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2813&p=7
        http://www.madshrimps.be/?action=getarticle&number=4&artpage=1965&articID=472

HDD...
    Go with whatever is cheapest the day I buy...   http://labs.anandtech.com/big.php?cfilter=21

    RAID?  Or just use one very large drive, and use my existing smaller drive to do an incremental
    backup of specific bits of data?

    http://www.anandtech.com/guides/showdoc.aspx?i=2796&p=3
    http://labs.anandtech.com/search.php?q=sata%201.5gbps&pricepgb=yes

Video (high end)
    http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2812&p=2
    http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2798&p=3

Video (low end)
    http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?Submit=ENE&N=2010380048+1069609641&Subcategory=48&description=&srchInDesc=&minPrice=35&maxPrice=120

    Not terribly great, but maybe actually on par with my current setup?  (though my video card is pretty limited)

        http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/powercolor-x300se_15.html

Video (built-in??)
    http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/powercolor-x300se_2.html

    http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/chipsets/display/i915g.html
    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813128016
        high points:
            - DX9
            - it actually does HDTV okay??   http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/chipsets/display/i915g_11.html
        low points: the xbitlabs link absolutely disses it, saying that very cheap ATI/nVidia cards are better



Question: When will DirectX 10 be coming?
    When Vista ships.  Which is currently aimed for Jan 2007 :(