Core i7 - spec guidance

[jaybob777]

OK, my old coal burner pc has died and its time to put my hand in my pocket and buy new. Not a Technical type really so looking for some guidance. Budget is around £1500 ish. Bit of research suggests i7 core is probably best bet. Question is what to put it with?
I need a reasonably good gaming machine, certainly capable of handling most flight sim type software.
For me, its my office machine, so the usual MS office kit plus some good photo editing/drawing packages.
Mesh XGS+ looks a Rolls Royce spec but probably far more than I need: i7 975, 2 x 1GB ATI 5770 DDR5 DX11, 8GB 1333 Dual chan DDR3, 2TB 2 HDD..........

Would love to build my own and probably could mechanically. Getting it running is where I would struggle.

So, any thoughts from you experts out there? Much appreciated.

 

[Nubbleet]

Eww, 975 is a big no lol, definitely not worth the extra $700 when you can EASILY OC a 920 to that speed. Here's a good list to start with. Will you buy from NewEgg? And what's your budget?

i7 920
EVGA E758 or ASUS P6T Deluxe V2
2x 5870 or 5850
6GB OCZ Gold DDR3-1600 (or 2 sets which is 12GB if you need that much)

 

[masteroc]

Memory needs to be in increments of 3gb since it is triple channel for the i7s (920 and up). Like Nubbleet I would suggest the 920 over the 975 since you really arent getting much more for your money.

Also you might want to consider getting a smaller (or SSD) HD to run your OS and apps from and have the 2tb as just data storage.