CPU/Mobo New Mobo/CPU which one??

[Crazy_Eddy]

ASrock on the other hand is regularly giving out specific optimised BIOS for nvidia cards for this board

I could be wrong, but to me "optimised BIOS for nvidia cards" sounds like something the folks in Asrock's marketing dept would come up with. It is realistic to say that nVidia chipsets are optimised for nvidia cards in comparison to ATI cards, but to say that a BIOS plays such a big deal sounds like pushing the limits.
This is turning into an unending debate over Asrock products. Like I said before, Asrock hasnt left a mark in the motherboard world as a maker of "quality" products. I have personally seen friends having weird problems with their systems, only to open up and discover there's an Asrock/Mercury etc under the hood.

 

[Haste]

Don't believe me, check out thier BIOS update page and see for yourself, they actually are giving out fine tuned BIOS for Different nvidia and ati cards, and also some high performance rams.
http://www.asrock.com/support/Download/dl_k8combo-z.htm
As far as build quality is concerned, i don't have much experience about that('cause this is my first ASrock product), but i think a 3 year warranty is good enough to satisfy that and also even our Hardware expert Darklord once remarked, that ASrock's build quality is supirior to Gigabytes.
http://www.techenclave.com/forums/showpost.php?p=19670&postcount=7&highlight=Asrock

 

[archish]

@Amol: the 2800 and K8n combo's are available in the market which are offered some discount than what you would get if u would buy them separately. Just scout around and i m sure you will be able 2 squeeze in the K8N. Also if ocing is not a priority u can go for the K8V-X. One more factor is that the K8N's based on the nf3 chipset while the K8v is based on the via k8t800 chipset, however if you are not too finicky abt chipsets choices as well then go for the K8v to save some dough.

@Anish: An equivalent performing intel setup will be expensive than the AMD one Besides there's support for DDR400 so dont worry abt that.

There is no performance difference b/w the via and nf3 chipsets but on some tests i have seen the K8V-X outperform the K8N at stock speeds

 

[Grease Monk]

The MSI radeon xpress board DOES NOT have an AGP slot. It has a PEG x16 slot. Stop spreading misinformation if you are unsure urself.

sorry ...my bad :S