Wheee_It's_Me! wrote:Scintilla wrote:everything is going to go 64-bit... and, um, has Intel released a 64-bit processor yet?

o_O
The Itaniums are all 64bit procesors, so are all the newest Xeons. Which was a lil stupid on their part cause that basically just killed off their Itanium processor line. *shrugs*
Uhm as Scintilla said, Xeons are generally for servers and thus not consumer level. Consumers can purchase and use them as you did, but as you also showed, you're going to pay a premium. Also consumer-level 64-bit pentiums aren't even on the roadmap for this year for Intel. I imagine they have their design done already (esp. since there are rumors they have it in Prescott already), but are just validating and such.
My advice is what you originally had slackergirl. An Athlon 64 3000+ performs extremely well and is a fraction of the cost of a P4 EE, Xeon, FX, etc. For the editing you'll be doing (and even non-amateur), it will be sufficient. Trust me. I know folks who edit on PII 350's and others on Athlon 1800+ and they edit just fine and flawlessly. However, might as well take the 64-bit jump (that inevitably will come. I can guarantee that.) now while it's fairly cheap.
You can build a good 3000+ machine for probably under $1,000 which is half the price of a xeon server. Funny that this is coming from a dual-processor person who spent around $2,000 on his editing rig :-/. I suggest going through newegg. Sure they may be more expensive on *some* things, but for the total on *all of it*, it will be comprable. Best to ship from just one place too. Saves money.
And I agree with Hatter on the memory. Don't skimp on memory. It's very important and more is better...quality too.