A couple weeks ago, I was contacted by my college out of the blue and informed that I'd won a secret scholarship for an essay I wrote. Free money! Pretty awesome.

So I decided to put the money towards building a new computer, and retiring my dinosaur P4 Prescott. It's been a long while since I've built a PC...my last custom build was a P4 2.8 GHz Northwood with a Radeon 9700 Pro 128MB, which at the time was a beast that could chew through Morrowind like no other. These days, I do quite a bit of 3D and video rendering using Cinema 4D, After Effects, etc., and my single-core dino just can't cut it anymore. So after quite a bit of research, I put together the best bang-for-the-buck machine for motion graphics, music creation, and gaming under $1000.

Specs of my new machine (already had monitor and mouse, all else is new):

CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Xeon X3350 (2.66 GHz, 12MB L2 cache) (virtually identical to Q9450)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
RAM: 2G G.SKILL DDR2-800 RAM x2 (4G total)
GPU: on hold - using a 7950 GT OC 512MB for now, upgrading to an eVGA 8800 GT 512MB when I have more money
Hard Disk: Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500G 7200 RPM SATA drive (32MB cache)
Optical Drive: Lite-On DVD-RW/CD-RW w/ LightScribe
Case: Coolermaster Elite 330
PSU: Rosewill 550w
Keyboard: Logitech UltraX (check this out, laptop-style keys!)
Mouse: Logitech G5 (birthday present from my boyfriend )]
Monitor: Soyo 24" LCD (PVA panel, 1920x1200 native res)

Some notes:

- The X3350 is virtually identical to the Q9450 (only missing sleep mode instructions, because it's a server chip), and is pretty much the best value in a 45 nanometer quad core at the moment. The trick is FINDING one! I called and emailed almost 100 retailers before deciding to take a chance and buy one at a high markup from an independent seller on eBay. Even eBay is almost devoid of these chips now, and no one knows when either version (X3350/Q9450) will be back in stock. The Q9300 is a good alternative, but has only 6MB of L2 cache, and a lower multiplier than the Q9450/X3350. It can be had for about $250, though, as opposed to the $320-$400+ that the Q9450/X3350 chip is going for. (I paid $399 + S&H for mine!)

- I was going to build a Q6600-based system (65nm chip) at the start of this year, but I'm glad it got postponed...these new 45nm chips run cooler, use less power, and offer a slight raw performance edge over the old 65nm chips. But the biggest difference is the inclusion of SSE4 instructions on the 45nm chips, which offers a nice performance increase for A/V creation and editing. As tempting as the Q6600 is with its recent price drop to $200, I would still recommend a Q9300 or better for anyone who works with motion graphics or audio. The Q6600 may overclock higher, but you can't make up for lack of SSE4 with overclocking.

- I'll be running XP Pro 64. Was considering using Vista Ultimate 64, but decided against it as my main OS. I did give Vista fair consideration, though, and am intrigued by the way it manages system memory. I'll install it on a partition and see how it goes. If there is a substantial performance increase in the apps I use most often (particularly the Adobe CS3 package), I don't mind making the jump. The fact is that Vista was designed in the multicore era, and takes advantage of current technology in certain ways that XP doesn't. Of course, application support is my #1 consideration...I'll take a rock-solid OS that runs my apps 10% slower than a slightly faster OS that bugs out on me 10% of the time.

Anyway...can't wait to put this monster together.