So I got a smoking deal on a Pentium D 830 Processor and I’m most likely going to buy a Gigabyte GA-8I955X Royal mainboard.
Given that, what memory should I get? I’m looking for 2 gigs.
Also, what is a good video card for this setup? I haven’t researched video cards in about a year and a half, so I have no clue what the latest cards are.
I’m looking at about a total of $500 between the video card and memory.
Thanks.
Are you planning on doing any overclocking? If so, we’ll have to spend more money on the ram than if not.
No, I’m not planning on it. I’ve had bad luck with head issues in the past and I’d rather not deal with it.
er… heat issues. I need to learn to preview.
Also, are you a very heavy gamer? Do you need/would you like a TV tuner built in?
Yeah, it’s for gaming. I don’t really need a tuner.
How good of a deal did you get on that Pentium D? I know you can get a socket 939 dual core Opteron 165 for $300 that will beat a Pentium 830 in most benches, especially gaming one. Just curious, as I can’t imagine why a PC gamer would go Intel unless they got a really good deal.
As for a video card, you could get a Geforce 6800GS for $210 (benches as well as or better than the more expensive 6800GT or Radeon x800xl) so on the Egg; the next worthwhile step up after that would be a Geforce 7800GT which are $310 after MIR.
I can’t say exactly what I paid for it, since it’s most likely proprietary info. However, it was a very, very good deal. Besides, for reasons that you should be able to figure out, I’m partial to Intel. 
The last video card I bought was a Radeon 9800 Pro, so you can see it’s been a while since I’ve researched. While it was a good card, the drivers seemed to be a bit on the buggy side. I never had that issue with my GeForce 4.
I’ll take a look at the cards you recommended.