CPU and Motherboard for gaming

Hello,
I am looking at purcashing new motherboard and cpu for a gaming PC. I am going to settle for AMD.

I am wondering which ones I should get. How will I know that the CPU I buy is going to be competible with my motherboard. Is there anything I should watch out for?

Thanks a lot.

 

First of all, good choice. You are not settling for AMD, you are choosing the hands down winner for gaming.

your price range determines the combo that you get, but here are the basics:

you want a Socket 939 Athlon 64, the best deals are the 3200+ and the 3500+. The Winchester core is slightly better than the Newcastle core, but you wont notice too much of a difference unless you're a hardcore computer enthusiast who tweaks and overclocks--by the sound of it, not quite your area just yet

Any motherboard that says it is Socket 939 will support the AMD 64 socket 939 CPU of your choice. Motherboards brands to look at: MSI, Asus, Abit, DFI, Gigabyte.

Also, if you are using your old video card, you'll have to go with an AGP motherboard (preferably nForce 3 Ultra), as opposed to the new PCI-Express motherboards with the nForce 4 chipset.

 

don't forget to get quality RAM ... Corsair is supposed to be the best ... don't get the value RAm you'll get what you pay for ... I like my PQIs even though they don't do the timings they're supposed to but my mobo is supposed to be picky w/ RAM **shrugz**

and a good PSU ... all your components depend on the PSU to give it the required amount of power when it's needed most so don't skimp here ... Antec, Fortron, Enermax, PC Power & Cooling make good PSUs

 

Also if you post how much you wanna spend,us guys love building fantasy PC's for the cheapest price,without sacrificing quality!

 

I would give my right arm for an amd 64 fx

 

lol ... I dunno .. that would make it kinna hard to play far cry

 

i would modd me a plastic one

 

your computer would be outdated in a year but that lovely plastic arm would give you great incentive not to lose the other one when the new batch of cpu's comes out

 

Haha. I've been saving up for this (countless hours of summer job for games)... I am willing to pay about $1000 into this. Should I get dual channel RAM or no?

 

Thats it??? I'd give my right nut.

And thats a go on dual channel, if you are looking at mid to high end mobos they should all pretty much have it. I'd recommend Asus personally but can also vouch for MSI's mobos.