So I was writing a hueg post when my bro's PC crashed(the one I'm using off and on while I wait for parts to come in or whatnot), so I'll keep it a bit shorter this time. My PC is dead; there are some toasted capacitors on the mobo, and after a long string of part failures in the past, this finally did it in. RIP Lazycakes. 
So I need a new one now. I have money set aside for it, so it's not that huge of a deal, but I'd hoped it woul d last until after xmas because it would be better financially that way. However, it didn't so I suppose I need to do it now.
I've done some heavy research and have found some parts I really like, but as always, there are some key components I'm not sure of.
I'll lay out the parts I'm seriously looking at here, with some other ideas in case I need to cut prices:
PSU:
A) Seasonic X-650 Gold ($200)
b) Antec Truepower New 750 ($130)
c) Corsair TX-750 ($120)
Graphics Card:
A) Any Radeon 5770 model ($170-195)
b) A Radeon 5850 model, but I'd need to cut costs elsewhere ($305-335)
c) I keep my current undamaged 7600GT for now. ($0)
RAM:
A) Mushkin Blackline 4GB(2x2GB) DDR3 1600 ($134)
b) Gskill 4GB(2x2GB) DDR3 1600 ($93)
c) Something comparable that I haven't listed that you recommend
Case:
A) Antec P183 ($135)
b) I keep my Antec SLK3800 case and hope it's good enough. ($0)
HDD:
A) Western Digital Caviar Blue 640GB ($60-70)
Those parts are solid. I'm aiming for a quiet, efficient machine, that's upgradeable, so those all work. Now, I can, as you can see, keep some current parts and still have it functional...the obvious choice being my case(as wonky as it is, it works).
I haven't listed processors because that's what I'm stuck on. Do I go AM3 and low-cost as AMD is probably going to support AM3 for a few more years(two, probably), or do I look at Intel's 1366 line that's very very very expensive? I don't think I could take a 1156 chipset simply because they're already being phased out(unless you have proof otherwise).
So that's the decision I have to make. Do I go for an AMD build, or an Intel build? I'll do some cost comparisons:
AMD Processor: AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE ($180-210)
AMD Motherboard: MSI 790FX GD70 ($180)
Intel Processor: Intel Core i7-920 ($310)
Intel Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-EX58-UD3R ($210)
If 1156 is supposed to stick around(and not have incompatible revisions like 1156B and 1156C) then I'll definitely consider that chipset because it looks mighty fine, but as is I think I'll be going AMD for my money's sake.
So hard to make decisions like this quickly.