Intel to AMD Transition

As per my previous entry where I talked about by rig burnt because of lightning surge, but now I just gotten a new rig(with help of sponsor of course:D).

It took me a week to figure out what kind of component to choose because it must fits my requirement which is:
-Cheap
-Preferably with integrated stuff
-got PCIe and PCI(for graphic card and wireless pci)

and at the end, I end up bought
-AMD Phenom II X4 840
-Asus M4A88T M-LE click here to see more info about this motherboard
-4GB DDR3
-Cooler Master 550W PSU (for RM150) -> bought this from Lowyat.net forumer..very cheap..contact me if you want to buy one :D
since my HDD and graphic card is still functioning, so I just use it back..

At first, I'm thinking to build Intel i3 rig but because AMD rig can offer better performance(hopefully) for a lesser buck and I would like to try AMD(i've never have AMD rig before), so I straightaway chose AMD rig like above.

Picture below taken during assembly progress

                                                                                                                Motherboard box and the contents inside

full view of mobo

back panel of the mobo

AMD Phenom II X4 840 3.2GHz

everything is on its place and ready to fire up

My Verdict
-This is mini ATX motherboard..so, if I'm adding another RAM stick, I'll be hitting the wall already. Nothing much to upgrade with this mobo really
-I'm not fanboy ok. Since I've tried both AMD and Intel, this is what I came up with
   +Intel - Quite pricey, so many socket type, smoother
   +AMD - Cheap, socket is backward compatible, but not so smooth
-Many people says that AMD processor is running hotter that Intel bla3 but what I found is it's quite cooler than my previous processor(or perhaps it's not in the same league)

So, that is my entry for this time. The Asus serve me well till this time and most importantly it's bang for bucks.
But, if your have a bigger budget, consider choosing proper ATX motherboard for long term run.