Clueless Person looking to Buy New Computer

dfacto

No mystery here. I haven't been paying attention to the market for a long time so I have no idea what I should order for my new computer. I'm looking to build a decently fast rig for general gaming and 3d work without paying more than $800 for the core components (mobo, chip, graphics card).

I'm basically just unsure of what to get in terms of those three. The ram will most likely be 4 gigs of dual channel DDR2 from Corsair, I have all the drives I need already, and the case will just be a matter of looking and seeing if I can find something purdy-like.

These are the parts I was thinking of getting after some cursory research.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115131
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128353
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125227

Are those solid choices, or are there better ones out there, ie: cheaper but the same, slightly more expensive but much better, or same price but higher quality company? Also, if I decide to go for something fancier and throw down some extra cash should I invest more money in the graphics card or go for a faster processor?

Eric Chadwick

Since no one else has answered... there are plenty of review sites out there for building a budget workhorse PC. For example...
http://www.extremetech.com/category2/0,2843,838239,00.asp

breakneck

i'm no expert, but that seems like a decent graphics card for the $$
i came across this one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150316

same card, less money, comes with call of duty - doesn't have that Zalman fan though. . .

i have the quad 2.66 and i think its great. haven't tried to overclock - don't really need to personally.

don't know much about mobos -

thomasp

one thing to consider is that intel is expected to release a new round of CPU's very soon which look quite promising: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Nehalem - and even if you'd decide to go with the current models still, the release is expected to cause a pricedrop there.

rhoymand

I'm w/ thomas here, new tech means pricedrops on old tech. its more cost effective to buy models from 2 seasons ago. hard to imagine the video card I bought last year (july 07) for $280, is now $75 on eBay =(