I just thought I'd take a stab here after lurking for awhile. I'm currently into desktop video - converting dozens of home videos, current videos etc. I've found out that my Athlon XP1900 isn't a bad cpu, but when it comes to encoding it isn't a speed demon either. I believe it has a 133mhz fsb, and I have 512mb 2700 DDR. I'm ready to upgrade, and would like opinions on cost effective board/chip combos. As I understand it, Intel chipsets 875 and E7505 tend to work well with video - any suggestions for boards/cpus? I want a decent system that offers real advantage over my ancient K7AMA board and AMD - thanks for any suggestions! I'll be running three drives currently and a Plextor dvd burner. I'm not a gamer either.