I know this subject could start a fight, it did in the gaming clan I'm in. Should I go with intel or AMD, single core or dual?

I am looking at building my first computer. I have been to IBUYPOWER.com and price match the computers components to newegg prices and I can save $300+. I will use the computer for gaming mostly (BF2, WoW, Fear, etc) but the wife will need it for school papers. I have been researching on this build and have read about some campatibilty issues with software and sound cards. Here is what I have at a price of $2000 form IBUYPOWER

Case ( Raidmax Ninja-918 ATX Mid-tower Case w/450W Power Supply Silver

Power Supply ( NZXT PRC-550 550W Power Supply )

Processor ( [939-pin] AMD® Athlon-64 3700+ CPU w/ Hyper Transport Technology )

Processor Cooling ( [New !!!] iBUYPOWER Liquid CPU Cooling Fan System Kit --- [for AMD CPU] )

Motherboard ( [New !!!] Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe nForce4 SLI-x16 Chipset w/7.1 Sound, Dual Gb LAN, S-ATA Raid, USB 2.0, IEEE 1394, Dual PCI-E MB )

Memory ( 1024 MB [512MB X2] DDR-400 PC3200 Memory Module Kingston Hyper-X w/ Heat Spreader )

Video Card ( [PCI-Express 16x] Nvidia Geforce 7800GT 256MB w/DVI + TV Out Video )

Hard Drive ( 200 GB HARD DRIVE Maxtor 200 GB 7200 RPM Ultra ATA-133 8MB Cache Hard Drive )

CD/DVD Drive ( 16x DVD-ROM Drive Silver )

CD-RW/DVD-RW Drive ( [** Special !!! ***] 16X Dual Format/Double

Layer DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW Drive Silver )

Sound Card ( Creative Lab Sound Blaster Live! 24-bit 7.1 )

Speaker System ( [Black] Creative Labs SBS-560 5.1 Surround Speakers
+ Subwoofer )

Network Card ( Intel Pro 10/100/1000 Network Card )

Floppy Drive ( Mitsumi 1.44 MB Internal Floppy Drive Silver )

Keyboard ( Microsoft Internet Keyboard Beige )

Mouse ( Logitech MX™1000 Laser Cordless Mouse Silver )

USB 2.0 Accessories ( Add External USB 2.0 Hub (4x USB 2.0 Ports) )

Meter Display ( Thermal Temperature LCD Display Silver )

Flash Media Reader/Writer ( 12-In-1 Internal Flash Media Card Reader/Writer Silver )

Operation System ( [New !!!] MS Windows XP Professional X64 Edition )

I need to stay under $2500. Is this the best way to go? Also I was looking at the dual cores but was told they are only good for running multi programs and is not good for gaming. I should just save the money or bump up my proc. Thank you for your help and time.

Onboard sound will be as good as the SB live. Go Audigy or onboard. Onboard sound is really good right and is truly a viable option.

Single core unless you do heavy multitasking when gaming or game with a LOT of windows open.

With modern games you might want to consider more RAM like the OCZ Value VX series 2x1GB

I'd go with a less expensive, great quality board like the Abit AN8 Ultra or Epox Ep-9NPA+ Ultra - saves around $100.

Unless you have a sound fetish or are OCing heavy the AMD stock cooler does a good job of cooling the chip - gotta love the price too, $5 more for the retail box. Use onboard network instead of an add-on card.

I like this Super-Flower SF-201T case better.

Go for a 16MB cache HDD like this Maxtor Maxline III, 250GB or the WD SE16, 250GB.

A suggestion instead of waiting for that SuperFlower 201 to restock, this LianLi is a good alternative

Thanks alot of the input guys. I think I am going to just build the machine, getting my parts only from newegg of coarse. IBUYPOWER doesnt have some of those options for HDD and ram. I will more than likely use a thermotake PS about 550w. I'm not an OCing person. I just want a fast machine that I wont have to touch/upgrade for about 4+ years. (I have my first rugrat on the way) Thanks again.