thanks guys! I'm happy too!

I am not going to try to give you advice on the components, as you didn't mention what your budget was   As for the Windows 7 version, for what you are doing there is no real reason to get Ultimate. Home Premium should meet your needs.

Budget I'd like to stay $1k or less.

I'm happy for you BDBF. Hopefully it'll start a trend and more of us will see better times or at least an improvement.

I would recommend Windows 7 Home professional if your computer is going to be sitting at your house and you will be just gaming. If you are going to be using more than 3.5 GB of memory then get the 64-bit version of Windows (32 bit OS are physically limited to 3.5gb of memory use).

As for hardware I would recommend Newegg.com if you are going to build your own computer, Look for a nice board ( I prefer Gigabyte or ASUS) with a good rating and one that will not limit you on what you want to install. Try for at least 4GB of Ram  any less and you will not be satisfied. Try for a DDR3 compatible board also and that is the latest and greatest memory type right now. Also make sure that it is compatible with your CPU that you want to pick out.

For the CPU's AMD's are great for the price. If you have extra dough though look for a nice top o the line I7, they beat our AMD hexa-core CPU's but cost more. As for AMD CPU's go for the $199 PhenomII Hexa-core cpu and you will not be disappointed more than enough juice. If you want to spend less then pick up a black edition Phenom II quad-core and it should handle almost anything you throw at it. Just make sure they come with fans if your not into buying your own fans.

And for video cards, all the newest cards will play all the old games, (except for those random games that will have bugs with random cards). For card suggestions ATI and NVIDIA, the higher the number the better, and look at GPUREVIEW.COM. you can compare cards there all day long. But for ATI go no lower than x700 (ie 6700, 5700...) for playing games and NVIDIA no lower than x50 or x700 (for the older cards). Yes you can play the games with lower cards but just not as well.

And last and SSD (60gb or more) for boot and 1tb or more for file storage. Will make your computer fast as heck.

As for pre built, if you gots good money then look at your alienwares and maybe HP has one. But i would to well known names on prebuilt in case they screw something up.

Short recommendation:

Win 7 64-bit   4+ GB DRR3 ram    ASUS or Gigabyte MOBO   x700 or better GPU 

SSD hardrive for boot  And a big A** monitor!

If you need to do any of these 7 Pro

Run many Windows XP productivity programs in Windows XP Mode

Connect to company networks easily and more securely with Domain Join

In addition to full-system Backup and Restore found in all editions, you can back up to a home or business network.

If you need to do any of these 7 Ult. plus above

Help protect data on your PC and portable storage devices against loss or theft with BitLocker.

Work in the language of your choice and switch between any of 35 languages.

$1049  << link 

CyberPower Infinity 9000 

has an i7  I didn't read about it but it looks cool

Ya I checked that out.  I'm not so sure about liquid cooling.  The graphics card is weak.

I did that one time with Alienware pc it was like $37,000

thanks but no thanks I will buy a car with that kind of $$$ First

If I win the lottery I'll buy everyone on the forum an uber PC.

And there's a 35 acre peninsula on a local lake for 2.5 million that would be perfect for my anti-zombie fortress. It tapers to a narrow bit and then fans back out into the peninsula making it almost an island.

Not trying to derail the topic or anything.

OOO Frogboy should move Stardock down here and build and anti-zombie Stardock compound there.

I chugged a monster.

Here's one I'm thinking of.  Link  Thoughts?

If you want to go build-to-order, I find Systemax (from Tigerdirect) gives a little more for the money than Dell or Gateway.  But I suspect that anyone willing to even consider going build-your-own is better-off doing so.

Hope you're not in a hurry.  Sandy-Bridge sounds like it ought to be great once they get the chipset bug/replacement done.  If you want, I think you have to wait a couple months.  If you want AMD then you should be more future-proof if you can wait till AM3+ mobos come out.

I personally am waiting for more news about 64-bit Elemental before I upgrade from my 32-bit XP box.  Can't see much point in getting anything not 64-bit, but now just seems like a good time to stall and save money.  Then go crazy later later on SSDs, lots of RAM, big monitor, etc, etc.

And an 80-plus or better power supply should save a little money in the long run.

I don't have the knowledge to help you select the right system or the parts that would go into it but one suggestion that I would make is establish what you can spend then get the best items you can get within that budget.  You want a system that will serve your needs now but also be able to for the next couple of years.

Most folks would also suggest in getting the max memory your system can support.  It's not that expensive and will help things run a lot better.