Depends on what you're looking for out of it.
If you just want to use buisness apps, go with a K6-2 or Celeron based system.
Gaming for a good price...
I'd say an Athlon. Using a VIA Apollo KX133 chipset based motherboard. You can get a 600 Mhz Athlon for about $190 US. That and a good priced Motherboard will set you back about $300 total. That's about how much you'd get a similar PIIIE for. 128MB PC133 CAS2 SDRAM DIMM stick for about $109(price watch, you could also opt for 2 64MB DIMMs) to make use of the capabilities of the KX133.
That's about $420 for the basics. Thrown in say a 30 dollar CPU cooler(a bit extreme but better safe than sorry), and $80 dollars for a case + power supply. Brings you up to about $550 US after shipping.
Next up an EIDE Quantum Fireball KX 13.6 GB UDMA/66 for $160, Pioneer DVD-103S for $79(or a CDR for about $120),Guillemot 3D Prophet SDR 32MB for $200, Creative Labs SB Live! Value for $50, Generic Floppy Drive for $8, Generic speakers for about $20-30, Generic Keyboard and mouse for $10 total,USR Sportster v.90 Internal Modem for $55, CTX PR-711 monitor for $300, and Win98SE for $200, comes in at about $1632+shipping and handling, and gets you a rather NICE system.
Hopefully I haven't missed anything on the list. The Athlon board will give you a load of upgrade features in the future, compared to say a i810e based Celeron or 440BX based PIII board. Overall price/performance ratio wise you can't really beat the Ath(though Intel in it's haste and stupidity tries to compare the Celeron with an Athlon....jeez...).
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"I hope you make it, Tarkington. Just don't pull the handle till after we've hit. Promise me."
"I'm behind you all the way CAG..."
-Captain Jacob Lee "Coolhand" Grafton, and Lieutenant Robert "Toad" Tarkington, Final Flight