However, if you look up your favorite PC magazines and check out ratings for mainboards, a few brands will get rave reviews. These will be the SAME brands in most magazines. These are the ones to buy or specify to be used by a custom PC builder. These boards have SETUP options that optimize performance way beyond the default settings.

Also, get the FASTEST memory available, at least 512 MB of it. Memory speed should be at least 400 MHz. Processor speed should be at least 2,500 MHz.

Also, get TWO hard disks, and put the pagefiles on BOTH.

Also, see www.theeldergeek.com for information about SERVICES (under letter S). It will tell you which services to turn off to greatly speed your computer without any penalty. The junk services that Windows NT and XP include can kill the performance of even the fastest machine. But some services are necessary, so use the above web site to turn off services very selectively.