[chilepepper]

Quality really is important. I recall some of the really lower end motherboards were put together with some cheap capacitors (mylar most likely). They worked fine for the first year or two. Then the caps would outgas and start failing in really subtle ways. All the good boards have high quality caps, usually tantalum.

I've been running my homebuilt ABIT BP6 with dual matched Celeron 366 MHz overclocked to 550MHz for about three years now. Runs 24/7 and is pretty stable except it occasionally burps when it overheats (even though it has about 8 fans ;)

The ABIT board is a true work of art...(runs Linux RedHat configured for symetric multiprocessing, of course: is faster than our $25000 SUN which we bought just five years ago)

[CyberCowboy777]

SMP is great stuff

I can't wait to build a AMD SMP system ($$$)

Though you are limited on the MS O/S options if you want to go SMP. Linux would peak my interest if I could run SMP and my games.

Overheating is a real issue these days. I run an overclocked XP 1700+ (to a 1900+) and have been able to keep it cool enough though. Quality CPU Heatsink and Fan, Silver Oxide, 5 fans and Aluminum case.

You are exactly right on quality parts, you should see how many Power Supplies I have replaced this last year. (Not put in by me originally)