New PC, cheap/good enough to play PR

[ComradeHX]

Newegg.com - XFX MI93007 AS9 LGA 775 NVIDIA GeForce 9300 HDMI Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - Intel Motherboards - motherboard
Newegg.com - NZXT BETA EVO Classic Series CS-NT-BETA-EVO Black Steel / Plastic ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Computer Cases - case+power supply

I am putting in a crappy single-core Pentium 4 2.6Ghz processor(ran BF2 well enough).

I need some suggestions on what brand/capacity of RAM to buy and what else do I need(I am transferring what I can from my old PC- a crappy DELL dimesion 2400)?

[SnipingCoward]

which os do you want to run on it?

since you are getting an intel you can go with the /3GB switch - and get that amount of GB

i am having trouble with my AMD 64 4000+ (2.4GHz) hitting the limit
and as of PassMark Software - CPU Benchmark Charts mine has 200 point more than yours
so i dont really think thats a good idea to get a P4

ps: i like your sig, which anime is that?

[ComradeHX]

which os do you want to run on it?

since you are getting an intel you can go with the /3GB switch - and get that amount of GB

i am having trouble with my AMD 64 4000+ (2.4GHz) hitting the limit
and as of PassMark Software - CPU Benchmark Charts mine has 200 point more than yours
so i dont really think thats a good idea to get a P4

ps: i like your sig, which anime is that?

So, 4-8GB should be good, right? I will only run a XP since it is cheap and no compatibility problems with anything.

That anime is Utawarerumono(remembered as: "Underwater Ray Romano"...), it is quite weird(not a fantasy setting, but a sci-fi setting...) in the 2nd half, but I play the Visual Novel(game) of it and that is better than the anime.

CPU is apparently not my biggest problem, I have the CPU in my old PC right now so I can just throw it in the new PC just to see what happens.

I got the new case/MB mainly for more option on RAM and GPU.

[SnipingCoward]

make sure the cpu sockets match though

if running XP 32 bit you will be limited to 3GB (IF the intel supports PSE) so it might not be really helpful to get more
if running XP 64 bit - i had problems finding some drivers - but thats gotten better lateley

as of ram i suggest your looking at dual or tripple channel options so either get 2x or 3x packs - with XP i would say that more than 6GB is unneccessary (ppl reported that pr uses 1.5 GB - xp can be optimized to <500 MB - so actually everything above 2GB will suffice)
I got 4GB GSkill in dual channel mode and am able to deactivate the pagefile - generally i have had no probs with GSkill but Kingston seems to have a better price-value-ratio these days

i am not sure if your going for DDR2 or DDR3 but articles like those help me in those decisions
Conclusion - Review Tom's Hardware : DDR3-1333 Speed and Latency Shootout

also check the memory timing table for an insight on latency and speed CAS latency - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

the anime has a pretty high rating i think ill check it out thx (http://anidb.net/perl-bin/animedb.pl?sh ... e&aid=3427)

[ComradeHX]

One more thing, can anyone recommend a good enough but cheap(sub-$100) ATX motherboard for this case(will be used with Nvidia Geforce GPU, if that matters):
Newegg.com - Antec VSK-2000 Black ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Computer Cases
^Antec VSK-2000.

[SnipingCoward]

when trying to get a mobo to upgrade an exsisting pc you should look for
a) matching CPU socket (Socket A, 797, etc)
b) matching GFX card slot (PCI, PCI-E, AGP)
c) matching RAM slots (DDR1/2/3)
d) matching ports for HDD (ATA/IDE, SATA)
additional: scroll the mobo specs to see if it will support your desired amount of RAM size, clock speed (both RAM and CPU) and ofc dont forget so see if there are enough slots of each that you need
also: since its for gaming and you will have an extra gfx card try to avoid "onboard" gfx card since it tries to eat up RAM (shared memory) and might slow down the whole thing even if its switched off