holy crap! and other stories

so i ordered "The Count of Monte Cristo" from the library the other day, and it came in today. all 1365 pages of it. should keep me occupied for awhile.

also, i'm starting to look at putting together a new computer. i'm pretty happy with what i've been albe to find at newegg so far, and i've run it past some of my CS buddies (thanks guys!), but if you have any suggestions, let me know. it will probably be another month or so at least before i start buying the parts.

Motherboard: ASUS P4C800-E Deluxe Socket 478 Intel 875P ATX Intel Motherboard
Processor: intel Pentium 4 3.2E Prescott 800MHz FSB 1MB L2 Cache Socket 478 Processor
RAM: CORSAIR XMS 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Memory
Case: RAIDMAX Scorpio ATX-868WBP Black 0.8mm Japanese SECC Gaming Case Computer Case 420watts PS2 ATX12V Power Supply
Dave doesn't like standard PSU's, so here's the one i'm looking at now: ENERMAX EG425P-VE SFMA 2.0 ATX12V 420W Power Supply 95~135V or 180V~265V(Adjusted Automatically) UL (Level 3), cUL (Level 3), VDE, CB, NEMKO, SEMKO, DEMKO, FIMKO [i have no idea what about half of that means, but nate highly recommends enermax]

still looking for a good hard drive (120+ gigs) and video card (not sure whether to just get a 128 or splurge and go for 256), and eventually i'll want a dvd+/- rw drive to stick in it. i think i'm going to stick with the monitor i've got for now, and my speakers are still nice.

--update--
now that i think about it, i'll probably need a sound card too, eh? sound tends to make games a bit more enjoyable.

--update 2--
molson apparently prefers amd to intel for processors. it just seems odd to me that a 2.4 ghz processor would be better than a 3.2 ghz.

--update 3--
ok, so at molson's suggestion i have looked into an amd based system. i personally still prefer intel, so i'll probably end up mixing and matching from the two sets i'm looking at. or maybe getting something completely different.

MoBo
CPU
RAM
PSU
Graphics Card
Case
Hard Drive

Rough cost (before shipping): $1054.71. That's about half of what I paid for the Dell I've been using for the last three years, and this one looks a hell of a lot nicer. Especially when you consider the fact that my parents will be paying $300 of it. They wanted to buy me a new digital camera for graduation, but I convinced them that a new computer would be much more useful.

Again, feel free to weigh in.

--update 4--
ok... here are some more ideas:
CPU
MoBo

Discuss amongst yourselves.