A bit later... I've gone through a couple Intel configs and for the options I want and the power I want WITH my budget I just can't get it. I'll look some more though.
I'm still in the design phase so nothing is set in stone... aside from the budget.
Honestly I'm kind of out of the loop on mobos right now, so I can't help you there, but why not go with a cheap C2D like the
E6300? It's $169.99 at Newegg. Actually... go with the E6550- for some reason it's the same price and it's 2.33 instead of 1.8ghz and has a 4m cache instead of 2. It's also only $10 more than the AMD you were looking at. Get a comparable mobo that has the feature set you want and you're pretty much set with the rest of your wishlist. Personally I'd go with a non-Raptor SATA just because of the price premium- you could save money that way and have a lot more storage. That's completely personal preference though as the Raptors are obviously great drives.
