First time builder, my list

[RangerX]

I'm in the same boat you are.

Well I guess you could wait for Nvidia to put out a 6600 card in AGP. I've seen the PCI express version of the vanilla 6600 for about 130 bucks on up on pricewatch.com. I have no idea if that card is going to be made into an AGP format though. Anyone know??
this is what I'm talking about

You could go with a 6800 but that's going to cost you. Personally anything more than 200 bucks on a video card is hard for me to justify.

That may make me go to a 939 board with PCI express instead of a socket 754. I'm gonna wait till after Christmas though to build.

Personally from what I've read and been told if you're thinking the last generation of video cards go for the Radeon ATI 9600- 9800 series instead of the Nvidia GEforce FX 5200-5900 cards.

If you want the newer cards then go for the GeForce 6600-6800 cards because they seem to perform better then the ATI cards.

As for the 6600 card....
This is what I'm talking about

 

[krylon]

That card looks nice. any good reviews?

 

[RangerX]

Unfortunately there are very few reviews because it's a PCI Express Card which has not been bought by that many people yet. You'd need a socket 939 board with PCI Express to use it which costs more than the 754 board. That's why I'm hoping that either a AGP version of the 6600 comes out or the socket 754 boards get PCI Express which is possible.

Here's a review on the 6600 and 6200 regular cards.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2238

From looking at this I wonder if the ATI X700 wouldn't be better for 150 bucks.

IF you have 200 bucks (and you get an SLI motherboard) you can get a 6600GT card and then get a second 6600GT card later and use both cards...

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2196

 

[Nvidia fan boy]

i say a socket 939 board cause the 754 wont upgrade any more and a 3500+ 64-bit. 1gig of corsair XMS ram DC. and a 6800Gt and oc that mutha to ultra speed. that will last you a while. and an Abit board.