Did you decide on a case yet ? I would suggest the Antec 300, stylish look not flashy with great cooling and cheaper than the 900 by 40-50$.

RPG is my favorite genre. I liked Vampire Bloodlines, the Witcher, NWN2, Gothic 1 and 2 (old but excellent). I look forward to Fallout 3, let's hope it'll run smooth on the hd4850 because I ordered one yesterday. A Diamond for 150$ CDN no MIR with a free copy of GRID. :D

Not much shorter and 4 x 120 mm fans + 1 140 mm is plenty of cooling, and you can save 40-50$.

Why not the E8400 ? It's only 175$ at newegg.

What resolution do you run ? 1680x1050 and lower I would get a 4850, 1920x1200 a 4870.

My experience shows that a E6600 @ 3.0Ghz with an OC'd HD4870 (790/1100) gets an average of 32 FPS with lows in the teens and highs in the 40's at 1680x1050 on high settings with no AA. Very High isnt feasible.

Staryoshi87

Very different results from PC_X360. I don't think his hd4870 was overclocked.

I'm eyeballing a GTX260 or a 9800GTX+ Staryoshi87

Not worth upgrading from 8800 to hd4870 but worth upgrading to either of these cards that are both slower than the hd4870 ? Ok.

330$ ?

Visiontek HD4870 for 250$

Nobody noticed the type of motherboard he chose ?

You won't have good Crossfire performance with a P45 mobo. Get an X38 or X48.