Finding A motherboard and Graphics Card

ok. first off, im a big gamer, and i use all those programs like adobe photoshops, movie maker and many more. ive been having problems with my computer when i start up a game. When i start it up the sound works for about 30 seconds - 5 minutes and then shuts off. this doesnt happen to all my games only some like half life 2 and counter strike source. and when the sound turns off it stays off until i restart my comp and it works fine again. some people said it was my motherboard and others say its my sound card. this problem happened in the past so i bought a new sound card and the foxconn 650/651 series motherboard. it worked good for a while then the problem started happening again. so can anyone help me out on what i should buy or do to fix this problem. im looking for a motherboard that runs games really well and the sound is good and a graphics card that is better then the nvidia geforce FX 500. im willing to pay at least 150 on the motherboard and at least 200-250 on the graphics card.

my computer:
Intel (R)
Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.26 GHz
2.27 GHz
480MB of RAM

Not only graphics and motherboard, but for games, up the ram to about 1gb. Games love ram and probably already ate that 480 you have.

I would look to the Asus or Gigabyte mobos and get the highest model you can afford. For the sound card: Audigy 2 or the Turtle Beach Montego or Catalina. For video, I recommend an ATI Radeon X800 or better (the GT is an OK mid-range card).
Photolady is right-on about that RAM...sounds like you will need at the very least 1GB's worth.
Just for kicks, I would try moving your current card to another PCI slot to see if that behavior continues.

Ditto on the above really, make sure if you go for a X800/X850 series that you get a compatible motherboard for the socket, as the GT is PCI-E only, whereas the XL/XT/XT-PE are all AGP, 1gb of decent RAM, such as Crucial/Corsair/Kingston etc and i like Asus boards personally....best spec you can afford as Bistro said.


Liam

k thanks a bunch.