Need advice on January Build

[calcmp5]

Hey guys, I just wanted to hear some thoughts about potential configs along the lines of a Yorkfield Q9450, with the bigger cache, but i'd rather not pay a premium for the fastest processor, which i think is a good tradeoff. After that I will probably look towards:

(1) 8800GT, for now...figure if i can hopefully, get it MSRP by jan... it will last me till the new nvidia 9 series comes out a bit later

debating 2 of some premium 'gamer' ram or 4 gigs of some more mainstream...the price difference is too big to go 4 premium

I guess theres no motherboards officially out yet to compare with so I assume I'll probably go asus just to be safe

and something 300-400 gig 7200rpm HDD from a major manf.

I've never installed a motherboard/processor before so I"m a little hesitant to do it since ive had issues with overheating (nonoverclocking) in the past with an ABS Pc. I looked at AVAdirect and theyll install all my parts into the case i choose for like 80 bucks which seems extremely reasonable. Anyone have experience with them?

What are all your thoughts on what i should be expecting to pay for this come january? i was thinkin also of using Dell...i have an alienware AMD 4000+ but it has had it's ups and downs and im not sure the premium price was worth it.

I'm lookin to spend around $2000 for this config (no monitor/speakers) and gaming is the most important aspect

lets hear some ideas

 

[newschool]

Penryns will overclock EVEN MORE than the presente core 2s. So its EVEN MORE ridiculous to pay for an higher clock when you can get some GHZ for free.

x38,x48 and P35 are the chipset for penryns

p35 is the best if you dont want dual vid cards. x38 is high end but you pay for nothing.

gigabyte and abit are now considered equal to asus

 

[Roguestar]

Build it yourself, use the search function on the forums and find the many "how do i build computar" threads and the sticky on this forum for advice.

Premium 'gamer' RAM does nothing if you are not overclocking. It's mostly to sucker people in.

Get yourself a 500GB SATA HD from Western Digital or Seagate.

8800GT is a good choice.

As newschool said, the P35 chipset board is a good start. Read also the buyer's guide article on the main site.