I have Premeire Pro 2.0 and Vegas Movie Studio in which I work with direct HDV editing. I don't use the intermediate Cineform systems. If I was using it for professional work, I probably would. But in meantime, I'm learning about HDV.

One thing I have always done is keep projects simple. In other words. I will break a project up into natural subparts and edit the subparts and render. Then I pull all the subparts into a final time line for rendering of the final project. I purposely do this because I hate the thought of a crash that takes everything that I have worked on out, and it also keeps things a lot simpler for me.

I've noticed that vegas can take an eternity to open, although I've never had the problem with premiere.

Is there anyway I can have dual VGA monitors without getting a second card? I'm kind of a sucker for CRT technology and I have the desk space....

If your current card supports dual monitors, you could even get a cheapo pci card and have two cards if you're tite on money.

A lot of cards nowadays have a DVI and VGA output, where you can stick a DVI-VGA adapter on the DVI output. Some cards can only drive a digital signal through the DVI port, so avoid them.

A handful of cards can do 2XVGA without needing an adapter.

Actually that shouldn't be an issue. XP Pro's license specifically requires a separate copy be purchased for each box you run it on and the activation scheme enforces it. So unless you disassemble and retire from service whatever computer your existing Windows XP is presently installed on, you need to buy a fresh additional copy for any new computer you acquire anyway and Dell's price for the pre-installed OS with a new PC is cheaper than the retail cost of a boxed copy at the computer store.

Huh. I just noticed that case comes with a power supply - 350W... well, that's 40 bucks I save by not needing a second PS.

Question is whether that will provide sufficient power for every thing you might need to run. A heavy duty video card and extra drives could create issues.

I was worried about that....

The video card (after many changes) is looking to be an X1300, and there will be at least 2 hard drives in the computer.

Used to be 350 was a big number, and it may still be enough.

Alright... well, I'll play it safe. Found a nice case for 6 bucks more with 450W. 3 fans included as well.

Anyway, I think I'm ready to order.

1 x PC ASSEMBLY AND TESTING (PRE-CONFIG OS IF PURCHASED)
1 x Sunbeam Silent Storm ATX Tower Case 5X5.25 2X3.5 3X3.5 Silver Black 450W W/ MID-CASE Fan
1 x Intel Pentium D 940 3.2GHZ LGA775 2X2MB 800FSB Dual Core Processor Retail Box
1 x Intel D945GNTLKR ATX LGA775 I945G DDR2 PCI-E 4PCI SATA Video Sound GBLAN 1394 Motherboard
2 x Mushkin EM2 PC2-4200 1GB DDR2-533 CL4-4-4-12 240PIN DIMM Memory
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.9 250GB 7200RPM 16MB Cache ATA100 Hard Drive 5YR MFR Warranty
1 x 1.44MB Black 3.5IN Floppy Drive
1 x Powercolor Radeon X1300 450MHZ 256MB 128-BIT 800MHZ DDR2 PCI-E Dual DVI-I TV Out Video Card
1 x Microsoft Digital Media Keyboard & Optical Mouse Combo Black PS/2 OEM *With System Only*
1 x Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE PCI 7.1 Surround Sound Card
1 x Samsung SH-W162 16X DVD+-RW 5X Dual Layer DVD Writer Black /W SW OEM
1 x MSI PC54G2 WIRELESS 802.11G 54MBPS 2.4GHZ PCI ADAPTER
1 x 1 Year Parts & 1 Years Labour Limited Warranty On System Components

Total shipped: $1288.01 Canadian - without monitors.

Thanks to everyone who has helped me with this, your help is greatly appreciated.

The Antec 350W may actually be a "490W" watt PSU if you fudge the specs like other manufacturers do. That seems to be the case with Sunbeam, which doesn't list the maximum combined power output of its PSU.

How to fudge:
see http://www.antec.com/specs/SP350_spe.html
For each rail/voltage, take the volts and multiply it by the amperes.
3.3V * 22A
5V * 21A
12V * 10A
etc.
All all that up. You get your fudged spec. The power supply can't actually provide all "490W" at once... the max is 350W. Well you can probably go a little over because of tolerances, but the guarantee up to that figure.

Sample Sunbeam specs:
http://www.svc.com/cgac450-us-t.html
The 450W figure seems to be fudged.