Be careful, though. P4's do outperform the Athlons right now, but all the benchmarks I've seen that prove that are using Rambus DRAM (RDRAM) and the P4 533MHz FSB. So if you go the P4 route just make sure you get a P4 motherboard with 533MHz FSB that uses at least PC800 RDRAM (PC1066 RDRAM if you have plenty of money), as opposed to DDR or SDRAM.
(Or get a 400MHz FSB mobo and PC800 RDRAM and just overclock them both to 533 and 1066, respectively, which I have heard from AnandTech.com (thanks again, gekko) usually works fine with no problems.)
And don't worry, RDRAM not as overpriced compared to the other kinds of RAM as it once was.
db
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