I want to build my own computer.  I'm tired of these computers you buy in the store that are loaded with crap that I'll never use or want to use.  My question is what brands are the best for mother boards, cd-rom drive, best CPU chips AMD or Pentium, and so on.  I'm that concerned with cheapest just reasonably priced.  I also want my computer to be able to play the latest games.

Big_Nester it all depends on how much computer hardware experience you have.  If your pretty experienced, check out [url] www.pricewatch.com [/url] or [url] www.dirtcheapdrives.com [/url].  They are decent places to deal with.  If your a little lacking in experience, just call Dell Cmputers and they will build whatever you want.  They cost a little more, but they are the best IMHO.  I'm a sysadmin/instructor and we have tons of probs w/ Gateways and Microns . . . almost none with Dells.

Ballsy

Best way is to go to a local computer show
lots of vendors and low prices. I bought
a complete Celeron 500 kit for $330 or so (everything included (64Meg ram, CD rom, modem, sound, etc) except harddrive and monitor).
Everything was in pieces - I had to
put the mother board in, etc. I had to install
the operating system etc.
You can get bargain computers that are already
assembled.

A good site that will help you figure out which brands/models of components are the best is [url]http://www.anandtech.com[/url].  Anand has a lot of good reviews of various components.

Once you know what you want, [url]http://www.pricewatch.com[/url] is a good place to find the best price, as already mentioned.  I like to combine it with [url]http://www.resellerratings.com[/url] so that I have some ideas if the online retailer is reputable.  There's a fair number of low-price dealers on Pricewatch that aren't worth much.

I'd be happy to share some of my favorite places to buy and/or favorite brands and models of components.  But honestly it changes quite a bit over time and based on what purpose I am buying the computer for.

BTP

Let me reccomend http://www.compgeeks.com

Good stuff, good service, good price.

GunLvr, satisified customer

WWW.MICROPRO.COM

I purchased the stuff to build my system from them.  Real good service.  Go to the site, click on configurator and select the components you want in your PC.  Then purchase they will assemble for you and "burn it in".  I was very satisfied.

I suggest the AMD Thunderbird system
128 megs ram
Radeon graphics card

Bare bones system will include
new case
new floppy drive
new mouse and mousepad
new keyboard

Go to http://arstechnica.com/guide/system/budget.html

They update it once a month so it's due to be updated sometime this week.