I've had an aftermarket CPU fan for a while now. a nice big zalman. however I accidentally got a wire stuck in it and long story short one of the fan blades broke off. now my system is unuseable. however the computer itself is a p4 based on the old platform (socket 478) and I can't find a new decent CPU cooler. therefore I'm gonna do a full overhaul and get a new mobo/CPU/ possibly a new graphics card

so... any recommendations? i think I'm gonna jump over to the Nvidia camp for the first time in my life. (i was always an ATi fanboy). so I need a decent CPU, mobo and graphics card all for around 500 bucks. discuss

I used Newegg to purchase all of my stuff when I built my computer and it was pretty cheap, I will let you know the same sorta stuff that I got, they might not have everything that I have now cuz its about a year old.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16811217019

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16820231047

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16819103528

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813136163

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16814195029

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16827106075

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16824009091

Check that stuff out and see what you think. It might not be the best of the best now, but it was pretty good stuff when I got it a while back.

I like the asus P5K for what I use my computer for (which is actually 1080p h264 playback...)

so get the P5K base model, perhaps an OEM version of your preferred ATI card (try a radeon HD3000 series card... MSI and Sapphire are good choices for this) and a generic dual-core intel CPU and overclock it. 2.6 should be plenty unless you're playing crysis, in which case f**kyou. Should work out to be ~500 bucks, less if you can get the parts used or wholesale.

(that's actually my current setup... except I splurged on a second graphics card and a base-model quad-core. those go for 200 OEM, 220 retail, but you don't need it.)


EDIT: I reread your post and I realized that you wanted an nvidia card. well I don't really use nvidia because I'm not a gamer, and I don't feel like spending extra money for the brand name... ATI gets it done for me, and I can get them for damn cheap.