getting FS2004

That all sounds great, the hardware you bought should work beautifully.
Watch your deleted and junk folder, quite often the conformation goes straight to them.
Welcome aboard and I'm curious as to what you are going to do for a computer that can run it, did you get the Alien.
Just flying alone like you would do most of the time does not need a headset, ATC comes through your speakers and also on screen.

Thanks for finding me Radarman.
I'm getting the guy who does all my network maintenance in my company to design me a computer capable of running my vehicular crash simulations for my business and FS. So far we are at a PIV 3.6 mhz with 2 gb ram, dual 250 gb harddrives, dvd r/w, 21 inch LCD monitor with an Nvidia 6800 Ultra video card and we haven't decided on the sound and a few other little items yet. May switch to a 21 inch CRT rather than the LCD. Also looking into the possibility of dual video cards. Reason for going with Nvidia is that my vehicle crash simulator doesn't like ATI products at all for some reason. The techies at Engineering Dynamics (producer of the crash simulators) haven't been able to isolate the exact reason. It just seems to be a fact of life. I am going to check with the techies there again before we finalize the specs and check on the compatibility of the AMD processors. Quite a few of the gaming computers I have checked have AMD processors rather than the pentiums.

I was under the assumption that interactive meant that you could talk back and forth with the towers. Wondered how that would be possible.

Another question, unrelated, What is FS9? I keep seeing references to it in the posts but haven't seen a description yet.

I do tend to get longwinded, but there is so much more that I want to learn.

Al

FS9 is FS04, or FS2004. This is the ninth flight sim from microshaft, so we call it FS9

Are you getting the Nvidia 6800GT 256mb? Great card and yes for the long run your better off with SLI.
Have him install an Antec power supply, no lower than 450w, I would go for the 600w so there aren't any problems down the line.
Fans, let him put a Zalmen copper fan on your CPU, and have at least one fan in the front of the case to draw in cool air, and at least one in the rear to expel hot air.
You can buy cases with that in them. Top of the line http://www.lian-li.com/main.htm .

This happens with ATI or Nvidia, some computers and or software like one and not the other.
I know a few golf game course designers and when they have a beta test different problems arise with each card so in the long run the course comes out able to run on any machine, strange. Same thing with the drivers.

You do,( in a way) talk to ATC but it's with your keyboard.
You do talk with them at a multiflyer site (very popular) called http://vatsim.net/ . You have to download software to talk to them
Here other flyers act as ATC and try to make it as realistic as possible. The headset would come in handy then both for perfect sound and keeping the noise from your computer from bothering others in your home.