I recommend building the machine back *towards* the CPU rather than
*from* the CPU.
* First, get a good monitor, as you will be staring at it a lot,
so be kind to yourself.
* Next, get a good keyboard and mouse because you will be
interacting with those components more than any part of the
system.
* Decide on a video card to drive your monitor, and is suited to
what you are doing on the system. Also take into account noise
and heat (which is often, but not always, related) as video
cards can be hot and noisy components.
* The power-supply is an important component. There is no point
buying flash components and frying them with poor power.
* Motherboard next. All computers have a problem with moving
data around quickly, and a good motherboard will help a lot.
* RAM. Get what you think you will need, and then get a bundle
more :)
* Disk storage. Neh, if you run out of space you can get new
hard disks to hold moreâ holiday snaps. Speed is also
important if you skimped on RAM :)
* Other odds and ends, like sound cards and networking come
next.
* Finally, with the dregs of your funds, get the fastest CPU you
can afford. It will not be the flashiest number-cruncher on
the block. But
* All the DSP work is handled by dedicated sound, and
networking hardware,
* All the graphics work is handled by the dedicated GPU,
* The large amount of RAM keeps the system sprightly as
the OS employs large disk-caches, and
* You can keep the CPU well-feed with data as the
motherboard is quick.
My 2Â.
--
Michael JasonSmith http://www.ldots.org/
