New 003 Rack+ System Advice Please!

[thestonerocket]

Greetings,

I'm new to this wonderful world of Protools and will be purchasing a 003 Rack+ in January, as well as a totally new PC that I'm designing from scratch. Please, some advice:

- any comments / known issues / suggestions on my hardware set-up?

- is it still a good idea to go with Win XP Pro over Vista?

- is overclock a good or bad idea?

Thanks.

[thestonerocket]

A few other questions I have (by the way, I'm not being lazy; I've tried searching the DUC for answers but I'm having difficulty finding proper answers...)

Processors, etc.

-the motherboard I'm thinking of purchasing maxes out at DDR2 800MHz RAM; should I go with another mobo that can accomodate 1333MHz? Or, should I up the ante to a mobo w/ DDR3? Latency issues? PT8 compatibility issues?

-is it really worth the extra $300+ to go with a 3.0 Ghz system?

Hard drives:

-I'll want a dedicated drive for the OS (Win XP) -- should I install protools on this drive also?

-a drive dedicated to vst -- I'll be using BFD 2 & Omnisphere -- will one of the drives I've listed be adequate?

-recording drives -- should I go with internal or external? are the ones I've listed adequate?

[louielou]

Just got a 003 rack to use in conjunction to my Dell XPS 710. Works like a charm so far; even with the PT8LE upgrade.