I have:
-- AMD Phenom II X4 Black Edition (been looking at i5 2500k)
-- NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GTX+

Go go go.

First thing first...are you stick with manufactures for both? (i.e. amd for cpu and nvidia for gpu)?

I'll do whatever, really. But buying a new CPU will also turn into buying a new motherboard, so it'd be nice for everyone to be like "GPU! GPU!" Re: nvidia, I don't really care.

well, you're pretty much correct.....

As for me, I'll be the first to say GPU.

I know its a shitty rough comparison but I run a laptop graphics card (GTX 260M) and it's power is usually compared to the 9800 and it usually can plow threw most, but it is starting to get some lag with games with heavy particles and phyx (ex: Hard Reset Demo).

I have a desktop in the works I am planning on using 560TIs just for sake of being in a up to day model and the possible lasting of it.

I had a 9800 GTX+ and it's not to bad of a card! Probably going to throw it in my rig as a Physics card!

GO GPU!

In that case, I'm thinking the Radeon HD 6950 2GB. It's a little expensive, but not having to put money into a CPU / Mobo right now helps, plus I think it'll do well for a while.

Now just gotta wait for the grad loans to come through...

GPU and the 6950 would be a perfect upgrade for the price. The Phenom in no shape will be a bottleneck in games but in actual CPU intensive tasks like encoding, decoding, rendering, programming, etc then 2500k is where it's at even though you may be paying a little more.

The 6950 dropped pretty heavily in price over the last couple of weeks from almost $300 to $230 so it's a pretty safe buy.

Looking here http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html and here http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html
- going with CPU you'll approximately double the performance
- going with GPU you should triple the performance.

Of course the GPU approach will cost you less, but CPU will boost up overall performance (not only gayming). IMO you should go big:
- i7-2600k
- new mobo with intel p67 chip. Not sure about the z68 - looks like z68 should be your choice if you going to overclock CPU and if you have / going to have the SSD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_In ... s_chipsets)
- combo that with 8GB (2x4GB) of low CAS (I suggest 7 - top 8) and high frequency (http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi ... 2012800%29) and you'll be in heaven.

I got the i7-2600k + p67 + 8Gb CAS 7 1333MHz and I'm happy as Kano touching his own butt. I still have my old nVidia 9600, and I don't see any reason to upgrade the GPU (TF2, L4D2, CS:S, LoL, BFBC2 on high and 1680 x 1050 resolution run flawlessly).

Protip: if you have SSD checkout the manufacturer site for new firmware. Updating firmware may be risky, but it pays off. System rums much better after I did that for my Crucial C300 CTFDDAC128MAG-1G1.

Can I now get the pink "fomenta's bitch"?