I know I'm late to the party - and I don't get here too often anymore, sorry to say as well - coupla notes worth mentioning.

1 - If you have a lot of peripheral stuff (scanner, external HD, printer, webcam, etc.) each device you plug into your USB will draw a tiny bit of energy, but it asdds up and can choke your system. When we buy a new computer, one of the immediate things we do (because we DO have a LOT of peripherals) ir slap in a 900Ws power supply ASAP.

2 - One of our workstations would overheat, so my wife bought a little fan that sits beside it. Not enough - so now, it also has the side panel taken off. It no longer overheats - she's behind me playing WoW as I type.

3 - Graphics cards. And to be honest, I haven't read specifics about CS5 regarding ATI vs nVidia, but we've been using either/or for various machines and haven't noticed any performance issues or descrepencies. Also, understand we buy $200-$300 cards. Once you get past the $100, they start improving may things and between brands even out. The $100 or under - I go with nVidia.

4 - Regarding Macs - and this is not at ALL meant to start a haters war. When someone has a bunch of software and plugins, at least half (if not 2/3rds) will be OS specific. Changing the OS means a lot more than the case. Think of SLR cameras (where you can change the lens, buy a flash, etc. - high end ones). If you're a Nikon person, you can't just go out and get a Canon camera body - you'll have to buy all new cables, all new flashes, all new lenses - it's quite a huge investment to "just change brands".

Regarding Mac and PC debates - people, just pick the ones you like and use it. No matter what gripes/comments/hangups/preferences, at the end of the day, when you look at a 3D image, or watch a video, you have to take the artist's word for it as to which computer OS was used to run the software you actually used to perform the tasks needed. Both work great (I use both, BTW) - just pick the version that suits you best.

Hope this helps, and everyone have a Merry XMas!

-Lew