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One of those games, Dragon Age, isn't very demanding at all on PC whereas the other one is. Given your price point, I suggest using AMD as you will get more for less cash. Below is a suggested parts list.
Case:
Broadway Com Corp R-910 Black thick Steel ATX Full Tower Computer Case - A large full ATX case is useful if you plan on upgrading to the gigantic, and powerful, graphics cards like the 5780 or the 5970. $79
Motherboard:
GIGABYTE GA-790FXTA-UD5 AM3 AMD 790FX - This is a new motherboard. It allows for AMD's AM3 CPU's (the most recent kind), DDR3, CrossfireX, and USB 3.0. This motherboard uses the 790FX chipset which allows for full 16X speeds on two of the PCI-Express X16 slots. Usually, when a graphics card is Crossfired with another on a different AMD chipset, the two cards will go at half the data transfer speed, thus slowing down the GPU. This motherboard doesn't have that problem. $184
CPU:
AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Deneb 3.4GHz - AMD's best desktop processor. This is a Black Edition CPU which means the multiplier is unlocked, allowing for easy overclocking. The Phenom II series of CPU's can hold their own against the i7 and i5, to a point. The i7 dominates at the i7 950 or higher, which is the $500+ range of CPU's. $184
RAM:
G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 - The motherboard can use DDR3-1333 or DDR3-1600 RAM. Remember, you need a 64-bit operating system to use all 4GB. $94
Graphics Card:
SAPPHIRE 100283-2L Radeon HD 5770 1GB - This is in ATI's latest Radeon 5 series. Although this is a mid-range card, it handles all of the games you mentioned quite well. The 5850 is a step up from this, but is almost twice as expensive. The 5770 runs quiet and allows for DirectX 11. I toyed with the idea of scaling back many of the components in this list to add a 5850 to your PC. But I decided not to since you should have a powerful core group of components with a powerful motherboard, CPU, and power supply, and then add a GPU on top. Also, GPU's go out-of-date very quickly whereas those components I just listed stay around for a much longer time. $164
Power Supply:
OCZ StealthXStream OCZ700SXS 700W - OCZ makes pretty good power supplies and can easily power this setup and many Crossfire setups. $79 (Before $25 mail-in rebate)
Hard Drive:
Western Digital Caviar Black WD5001AALS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA - This is plenty of space for most users. Western Digital's black series is their performance line and always get a hard drive with 32MB of cache. $69
Optical Drive:
LITE-ON 24x DVD Burner - Bulk Black SATA Model DH-24AAS - A simple optical drive is all you need. $28
Operating System:
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit - You need a 64-bit operating system to use 4GB or more of memory. You cannot reuse an old copy of Windows on a new computer if it is OEM. Doing so violates the license. PC's purchased from Dell, HP, or any other large manufacturer have this type of Windows installed. $104
Total Cost: $993 (Before rebates)
This post has been edited by DJBPace07: 20 December 2009 - 02:51 AM
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