i guess the biggest question i have is -

what kind of computing power i need?

audio
i want my system to run higher end audio (not top of the line but decent).
- ill primarily be playing higher quality mp3s. do you think i can get away with an integrated sound card or am i going to get a way better audio experience w/ an aftermarket card? id like to have sat radio at some point... should i be considering plugging this into an aux line on a sound card or split/modify an aux input on my HU?

video
im not really concerned with high quality vid but id like my touchscreen to have a decent resolution available to it.
- i may have a DVD drive so it would be nice to be able to view a DVD no prob (i think that most integrated vid cards should do that...right?). i wont be running any games or anything like that.

car peripherals
im going to be running vehicle diagnostics on my OBDII ecu... any additional CPU resources needed for this? i would assume its a fairly easy thing for the computer to handle... i also assume it's communication through the serial port in the back. im also going to be sporting the fusion controler to control and monitor my vehicle with a few sensors... again any additional CPU resources needed? any software recommends for diagnostics??

additional words
i would like my computer to boot from flash (im told fast boot times)... can i just install a flash card and set it up through BIOS to boot from the flash but in any other case read/write to a reg 2.5/3.5 hd?

oh yea, and a wireless card.. nothing crazy just a run of the mill deal.

i did some power supply calculating and the online calc came up with a min of a 115w ps. am i safe w/ a 115w or should i shoot for a certain % over the recommended?


...aaaaaand back to my original question...

what kind of computing power will i be needing (CPU speed and RAM)?
- ive been looking at different mobos and im basically just looking for the i/o ports i need because im thinking that most anything will run what i want (basically audio and diagnostics). however, id like some insurance... it'd be nice to know i can perform simultaneous tasks pretty cleanly... i dont wanna be ctrl-alt-deleting on I95 heh.

this is kind of a long drawn out post but any help is greatly appreciated!

-tim