Homebrew P4 encoding rig

[temporance]

I'm looking to upgrade and build a dedicated encoding box (that will eventually be headless and run linux).

Can anyone who has recently purchased a new rig help me with my decisions? I literally don't know where to start, but I guess the most important decisions are which motherboard (I want this to do 10/100 Ethernet and graphics) and which flavor of RAM.

Fast RAM and fast disks are the priority. I don't care about 3D performance.

Let's say budget is 800 USD.

Any help gratefully received!!

[temporance]

forgot this:

S478 Intel 845GE ATX A V L
Mfr code: GA-8GE667 PRO

P4 2.53 512KB S478 Box 533FSB
Mfr code: BX80532PE2533D

256MB 184Pin DIMM PC2700 DDR RAM Non-Parity CL2.5

Deskstar 120GXP 82.3GB UDMA100

Any good?

[Dire]

If price is important, choose AMD. Athlons have a better price/preformance ratio

[Tristan92]

For compression, I prefer Intel, more stable and (maybe) efficient in pure Mpeg2/4 compression.

But, for a workhorse, dual AMD is cheaper.

For HD, it's better to work with twice, data are transfered from one to another : it's faster when muxing!

For Lan, prefer 3Com90x or Intel pro100, drivers are less CPU consumming since the card do all the job.

256Mo are enought.

Tristan