My personal choice would be the E8400 and 4Gb of 667MHz RAM. But that's because (apparently) the E8400 is quite good for overclocking to the magic 3.6GHz (it seems you just have to raise the front side bus to 400KHz from 333KHz: the E8400 has a 9x multiplier). If you're still keeping clear of overclocking for the time being, then I'd still suggest you go for the E8500 (basically, the same chip as an E8400 but with a 9.5x multiplier) plus 4Gb of 667MHz RAM. If you don't mind spending the extra few dollars for faster RAM then go for it: it might make you feel that the PC is performing better and no one will ever care (or know) if it's only placebo.My main add-ons are Level-D 767, PMDG 747X, Activesky X, FEX, FSInn, UTX and GEX. They all work fine with Vista 64 but I cannot vouch for the products you mention. If in doubt, I suggest you choose Windows XP, or Vista 32. I had not previously heard that SP1 improved Vista 32's ability to use large amounts of memory and I don't immediately see how it could do so (except by efficiency tweaks) because it is constrained by the number of memory addresses that can be enumerated in a 32-bit operating system - but of course I could well be wrong.Tim

So still go with 4 gb ram even if I chose Vista 32 ?

You sure can.......But will have to get the plus 3 gig patch is all.....More ram means way faster loading times ,and smoother texture loading in the sim......It a small price to pay I think for that extra push......But it will run fine on 2 gigs ......

I'd say get the C2D. Also, I'd look at bestbuy's Velocity Micro systems. Not bad rigs at all... Somewhere over the past few months, I blew off building a new pc and just bought one out of the box. Never thought I'd see that day.

There is always the Dell factory overclocked 720c'sPROCESSOR Intel

Well it doesn't matter now ... had to replace all the brakes on my car - PC is put on hold for a bit now :@Thanks for all the help anyways though, I'm much better educated for when I do look at a system in a few months.