Total noob, need help!

Hi, im a noob who needs to build a good gaming computer for around $700. I dont know much about computers so i really need help.

my goal is to get a computer capable of playing upcoming games like Empire: Total War, and other graphically intensive games like Crysis or Oblivion. I dont need a new monitor or a keyboard or a mouse or stuff like that, im basically looking for 4 or 5 main components

Motherboard: no idea what i need here

Ram: again, no idea what specifically i need but i guess it should be 2 gigs

Processor: no idea what i need but i would like a core 2 duo, one thats good but not outrageously expensive. around $200 would be ideal

video card: i have a slight idea what i want because i heard that the Nvidia 9800 GTX is a good bang for my buck at around $200

Power Supply: this may not be necessary i dont know, my power supply is old and noisy but maybe it doesnt have enough juice to run these components. if you suggest a power supply, the cheaper the better because i know some of them can get expensive

That is bacically all i need i think, please any and all suggestions are welcome

There are plenty of articles about this, but here's a quick and dirty list, you pic the companies and parts:

P45 motherboard - $100-$150 or so
E8400/E8500 CPU - $160-180 (if you are going cheap, check out the E7200, only $100)
2x2GB DDR2 800 RAM - low latency (Cas 4 or 5 and 1.8 v) (only ~ $50)
4850 for your GPU - great bang for the buck for around $150
Get a quality PSU - probably around 500w-600w (Corsair, PC power and cooling, OCZ, Antec) (less than $120)
Western Digital 640 GB HDD - 2 platters - great performance and value. ($80)

Come back with a list of components and we'll take another look.

Good luck. We'll help again soon.

Yes, p45 perform far better than q965, for less.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128345
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131333

Ddr3 is worthless. They give no performance boost under realistic conditions, only in synthetic benchmarks.

9800gtx+ for $230 is not a good deal. Performance as follows:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] =3341&p=13
http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] =3341&p=14
http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] =3341&p=15
http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] =3341&p=16
http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] =3341&p=17
http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] =3341&p=18
http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] =3341&p=19

9800gx2 is only $280 for factory oced version:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814133231

If you want more future proofing, consider a quad instead of dual.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819115018

Dual vs quad gaming performance, at similar clock speeds.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/c [...] 600_8.html

The 1gb ddr3 is video ram on the card itself. You can use whatever system ram you want.

ok, i will take your advice, this will allow me to spend more on the video card and less on the ram so in the end it'll balance out and i should stay in my budget range

I will buy the 9800 gx2, i will buy the 2x2 DDR2 ram, i will buy a p45 motherboard in the $100-150 range, and i will stick with the core 2 duo e8500 since you guys didnt tell me to change that.

and with this set up do you think i will be able to run high end games like Empire Total War, Oblivion and Crysis at high settings?

Yes, more games will be multi-threaded, but there is no such thing as "future-proofing." Certainly quads and more cores are the future, but the E8500 will be good for games now and for awhile into the future. The Q6600 is a great chip and does overclock well. That choice will be up to you.