Not AMD vs. Intel flame-war instigation but having been out of the PC buying loop for nearly 3 years I'm torn between two systems.I had setttled for a Dell Pentium D 920 but they let me down badly (delivery slipping from the 9th of Feb to the 24th for no explained reason so its been cancelled).The two systems I've narrowed it down to are:1.-AMD FX-53-ASUS A8N32-SLI Deluxe PCI-Express Mainboard - ATX-1024MB DDR400 Memory-250GB Serial ATA Hard Drive with 16MB Buffer-SONY 16x Dual Layer DVD-Re-Writable +R/-R/RW-256MB nVIDIA GeForce 6800 XT - TV-Out + DVI - PCI-Express-Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 4 Sound Card2.-Intel

Hi Chris, both systems look very good. Personally, I believe AMD currently has a leading edge. OTOH, dual cores are the future... Could you get the AMD with a dual-core instead? If that's an option and your investment is supposed to last without drastic modifications, that would be the one I'ld pick. Another solution could be to 'go single-core' for now and change the CPU at the end of the year or beginning of 2007? Just an idea... I find this a pretty useful indication regarding performance: http://extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1876715,00.aspHope this adds to thoughts, have fun, good luck and kind regards Jaap (should be in bed since ages...) :-) PS, I have a funny feeling FSX will do better with 2GBs of RAM so a hardware optimization might be indicated anyway in the a.m. timeframe? January and Febuary usually are good months to buy hardware (anything post Christmas!).

Both system do look Great!! I just wanted to second the above posters comments reguarding AMD...I have been running AMD Processors for 3-4 years now...They are the performance is pretty amazing...Good Luck with your decision!! and would love to hear how it goes!!EDIT: A couple of Comments: If you would consider the 7800GT card I personally think you would do yourself some justice....I have a 6800Ultra...and a 7800GTX...The performance advantage of the 78900's GPU is definatly noticable...The price of the FX-57 has dropped....I suppose due to the release of the FX-60 Dual Core...I don't know what price you looked up on the FX-55...If it was in the $850 catagory...That is where the FX-57 is now at newegg...

Thanks for the replies.My last two machines have been Athlons and they've been great performers. This XP2700+ hasn't had anothing other than an Audigy 2 added to it since it was bought over 3 years ago.Unfortunately I have had a couple of issues with the mobo. Its currently on its second and its showing signs of going too.Thats a very nice system you've got there Chuck.I tried all different combinations to try and get a FX-55 or -57 based system for under

I would personally opt for the AMD system.Craig