Thanks for your effort SndCastie - Interesting that your display is different from mine.
I looked again and have more information.
It must be some sort of automatic picture resizing issue.
After opening the window, firefox very briefly
displays a large box outline where the image is to go.
Then firefox reduces the box to just one or two pixels high,
so that the image just appears as a single thick line across the screen.
If I hover the mouse over the line/image so that the cursor changes shape to a hand
and then click, then the full image displays normally in a new window.
Also, clicking "zoom in", which is easier to do, does the same thing.

I would be happy to be proved wrong,
but I have a friend with a multi-core single CPU and it only uses one core.
I also know some windows professionals in the IT industry who agree with me,
so it seems to be an issue in which there is a lot of debate about what is true.
I do know that XP Home can handle hyperthreading, which is a different thing of course.

Hi Digitell,
Sorry to confuse you -  I didn't notice the four USBs on the main board.
I think you have chosen a fabulous PC, one I would love to have.

I have heard suggestions that XP Home does not support multi-core CPUs,
(ie. it will only use one of the cores), so that you cannot get maximum H/W performance,
BUT that XP Pro does.

Steven, do you know if XP Home / Pro and/or Vista fully support multi-core CPUs?

Also, if you buy XP Home or Pro, check with the vendor if you are getting one of those "free Vista upgrade" licences that Microsoft is giving out.

Check that the case has enough spare slots and connectors.
The case has only 2 USB front-side connectors mentioned in the specifications.

For example 2 x USB connectors is not enough for a USB mouse,  USB keyboard
and a USB printer connected all at once.

If two is not enough connectors, you will need either a spare slot that another USB card can be inserted into, or else a 4-port USB hub to plug into one of the USB connectors.

For example 2 x USB connectors is not enough for a USB mouse,  USB keyboard
and a USB printer connected all at once.

And getting a PC Case without enough slots is incredibly easy to do.
EG. we need lots of USB ports these days -  can be all of printer + keyboard + mouse +external backup drive + external audio speaker system.

Bigger fan(s) mean quieter PCs ( I've read somewhere).
There are full height and half-height slots, full and half-height hard disks.

When you get a configuration, post it here and then maybe svdl or another expert will make a detailed recommendation you can proceed with,
whether you build it yourself or order a custom-made one.

Oops, sorry Digitell, I see I left out the link.

The web site I saw is  www.velocitymicro.com/index.php who actually seem to be in Virginia.
Under their 'Systems" tab you can choose "Gaming" PCs,
or "Digital Media" PCs, which is perhaps the type of PC Build you have been looking for.

I have never built my own PC.  I do NOT recommend it, if you have never seen it done before.
Best to learn how by uprading old PCs by replacing motherboards and/or adding memory to them.  Figuring out what board goes where can be like a nightmare from IKEA as there is little or no labeling on them.
Some main gotchas are:
(i) Remembering to earth yourself to the PC via a cable with a clip attached to the PC case at one end and your wrist at the other.  [ We usually build up static electricity on our body, by rubbing and especially just by walking on carpet. ] Without the strap you can zap a PC board dead without even knowing it.  Any PC store will have them in stock.
(ii)  Not bending the pins on the end of some boards when you plug them in.  Be gentle but firm.

That's a relief, then.

According to Tomshardware dot com VISTA does NOT support OpenGL.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-vs-vista/page11.html

Just Googled this via query [ +indiana +"cusron built PCs" ]
I know nothing about this company which custom builds PCs,
but I am impressed by the varietyof options displayed on its web site.

In Australia, one telecom built all the telephone landlines, so we only have one phone book per city and it has everything in it.  So, all I have to do is look up Computers in the business section of the phone book and the computer shops are all listed there.

Yahoo Directory has a page for "computer retailer", Indiana at:
http://dir.yahoo.com/Business_and_Economy/Shopping_and_Services/Computers/Retailers/By_Region/U_S__States/Indiana/?o=a

Regarding monitors of the LCD type, if you want to watch DVD movies and/or do video editing,
monitor response times of 4ms (milli-seconds) or less are required for clear displaying of scenes containing fast moving objects (eg. car chases) [ smaller = quicker response].  Such monitors are expensive.
If you only need graphics for pictures and still photographs, you can still find monitors with excellent crisp displays and graphics rendering, but with slower response times of 8ms or 16ms.  These are much cheaper, relatively speaking.
Look out for the "native" pixel resolution - this is the resolution a monitor looks at it s best.

You don't really need to build your own, Digitell, just decide on the most important specifications.  The remainder can be negotiated at the store.
Research what you can eg. OS, graphics cards,  memory, etc. that you want, then go to a store that custom builds PCs and just tell them what you want.
In my country, Australia, these are usually small, so you should check that the store has a
long history behind it, in case you need to use their warranty in future [ and find out first how long the warranty lasts ].  These stores usually give out  price lists of parts and of PCs with "recommended_configurations" and provide free quotes for your preferred PC configuration.

You can save money on keeping your current monitor, keyboard, and mouse, too.

Hi Digitell,
I'd love to be able to afford such a machine as svdl wants.
However, there is still a lot of hardware without 64-bit drivers, which may never have 64-bit drivers [ especially with Vista available now ].
So, unless you are willing to buy 3+GB of memory, and want Microsoft OS,
staying with WinXP standard (ie. 32-bit) or going to Vista will be better in the long run.

I suggest that you have a look at what PC magazines are available where you live.
Look up there web sites to see if they have hardware reviews.
PC World  Magazine at www.pcworld.com/reviews/hardware does - it has a "top 10" for both Power PCs and Value PCs.
The technical specs and brands of these can give you some indications of which brands
and models of PC , motherboard, graphics cards are best for your budget.
Logging on to www.dell.com and doing a "custom build" of a PC can be a handy comparison too, both price-wise and specs-wise.

The number one and two most important things are CPU speed and  AMOUNT OF MEMORY.

Operating Systems.

For Windows XP, I recommend at least 1GB of memory to get the best out of a new computer.
For Vista, probably more.  For MACs and Linux, I don't know enough to say.

I GUESS THE BUG WINS for now.
Outlook Ex pressHelp says that spell checking uses Office Dictionaries only, so now we know why it happened.  I looked up my OFFICE 2003 HELP and found the item:CHECK_THE_SPELLING_AND_GRAMMAR_OF_TEXT_IN_ANOTHER_LANGUAGE
This is what it says [ Maybe OFFICE2007Help has a better answer]:
Some of the content in this topic may not be applicable to some languages.
The feature described in this Help topic is only available if support for the language you want to use is enabled through Microsoft Office Language Settings.
1.    Install the spelling and grammar tools for the language you want.
If you check spelling or grammar in another language, and the correct files aren't available on your computer, then Microsoft Word will try to automatically install them. If Word can't install the correct files, you may need to obtain Microsoft Office 2003 Proofing Tools.
2.    Turn on automatic language detection.
 How?
If you're working in more than one language within a document, Microsoft Word can automatically detect each language as you type it.
1.    On the Tools menu, point to Language, and then click Set Language.
2.    Select the Detect language automatically check box.
Notes
o    To turn off automatic language detection in your document, clear the Detect language automatically check box.
o    To turn off the automatic detection of a particular language, remove it from the list of enabled languages in the Microsoft Office Language Settings tool. Remove the language only if you don't want to use features particular to that language (for example, date formats) in Word and other Microsoft Office programs.
3.    Set spelling and grammar options for the language you want to work in.
 How?
0.    On the Tools menu, click Options, and then click the Spelling & Grammar tab.
1.    Set the options you want.
4.    Check spelling or grammar as usual.
 How?
By default, Microsoft Word checks spelling and grammar automatically as you type, using wavy red underlines to indicate possible spelling problems and wavy green underlines to indicate possible grammatical problems.
You can also check spelling and grammar all at once.
 Check spelling and grammar automatically as you type
0.    Make sure automatic spelling and grammar checking are turned on.
 How?
1.    On the Tools menu, click Options, and then click the Spelling & Grammar tab.
2.    Select the Check spelling as you type and Check grammar as you type check boxes.
1.    Type in the document.
2.    Right-click a word with a wavy red or green underline, and then select the command or the spelling alternative you want.
 Tips
o    You can use AutoCorrect to automatically correct spelling as you type, without having to confirm each correction. For example, if you type definately and then type a space or other punctuation, AutoCorrect automatically replaces it with "definitely."
o    If Word finds a lowercase word, for example "london," that is listed in the main dictionary with a different capitalization ("London"), the capitalization may be flagged or corrected automatically as you type. To prevent this, add the lowercase form of the word to a custom dictionary.
 Check spelling and grammar all at once
This method is useful if you want to postpone proofing a document until after you finish editing it. You can check for possible spelling and grammatical problems, and then confirm each correction.
Note   By default, Word checks both spelling and grammar. If you want to check spelling only, click Options on the Tools menu, click the Spelling & Grammar tab, clear the Check grammar with spelling check box, and then click OK.
5.    On the Standard toolbar, click Spelling and Grammar  .
6.    When Word finds a possible spelling or grammatical problem, make your changes in the Spelling and Grammar dialog box.
 Tips
o    You can correct spelling and grammar directly in the document while the Spelling and Grammar dialog box is still displayed. Type your correction in the document, and then click Resume in the Spelling and Grammar dialog box.
o    For a detailed explanation of a grammar flag, right-click the flag, click Grammar, and then click Explain in the Grammar dialog box.
Note  If you mistype a word but the result is not a misspelling (for example, typing "from" instead of "form" or "there" instead of "their"), the spelling checker will not flag the word. To catch those types of problems, use the grammar checker.

When I go into "R&L Options" there are two tabs:  "Regional Options" and "Languages".

Try  this when Office and Outlook are closed.
Click on "Languages" Tab.
Then click the "Details" button.
Then click the "ADD" button.  [ The "Settings" tab ].
Then click the upside-down-^ under "Input languages" and a pick list of languages should display.  Choose your language and click OK.
You should be back at the "Settings" Tab.
Choose your language in the "Default input language" in the upper half of the window.
Click OK.
Click Apply.
Click OK.
Reboot Windows XP.