Recommendations on system build

[friscoguy]

I've always been an AMD guy... since the athlons anyway but now I'm about to build an Intel rig. I'm pretty clueless when it comes to these. A friend is going to give me an Intel Core 2 Duo E6700 Conroe 2.66GHz and I need to buy a motherboard and RAM for it.

I'd like to spend less than 200 for the motherboard and I dont' have a clue on the RAM. In doing some light reading on the forums I see some mention of the P35 chipset for future proofing, that would probably put things out of my price range and don't really know anything about it. Anyway, just looking for recommendations.

I'm in desparate need of an upgrade cause I'm currently on a Sempron 2800+.. socket A

thanks

 

[nhobo]

Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R $140 at newegg.

 

[o1die]

Newegg has 2 p35 boards that are reasonably priced. The MSI p35 neo4-F is around $100 and has all the basic features that you will need. The Intel p35 board is $110 but is a legacy board with no ps2 mouse or keyboard ports. You'll need a usb mouse and keyboard to use it. The p35 is a new chipset, and some folks are having problems installing windows without a floppy drive. I've had no problems with vista or using sata I ports for windows 2k. But it's safer to have a floppy disk available with the sata driver for a fresh windows install. For memory, I recommend ddr2 800 which both boards can use. Some p35 boards recommend ddr3, but it's too expensive, so I would stick with ddr2 name brand memory, such as crucial or corsair. If you like asus, Fry's electronics has the asus p5k wifi for $199 this weekend at the stores only. It's also available at frys.com for $50 more.