I just ordered all the parts, as listed above. I added two 120mm case fans, but otherwise did exactly the list above. I went with the "cheap" GPU -- the 8800GT. That greatly raises the odds that I'll get around to a better monitor.
Interesting that I couldn't avoid shipping on the case fans, that cost nearly as much as the fans! But its not much in any case.
Final damage: $889.70 before mail-in rebates (worth a total of $40). So if things go perfectly, I guess this should end up being exactly $850, not counting whatever I do about getting a decent monitor or a fancy mouse.
All was ordered from New Egg except the video card ordered direct from EVGA.
Thanks again for everyone's help, especially Dall!
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<--mythic-->
Originally Posted by LeMieux
architecture and wont help out unless you're overclocking to the degree where you would need chilled-water cooling or more. This is solved by Nehalem (which will be called Core i7), but that will require a new motherboard and processor, so it's not worth spending extra or sacrificing other quality/features to get DDR3 support on a current motherboard.