So my 6 year old Laptop took a crapper on me, the motherboard fried out.
Laptops really don't have much benefit other than portability and you get things like overheating and such to look forward to avoiding after 12 hour school days of using the computer.

I need help deciding on a desktop computer, but if there is a good laptop I'll pick up on it.

I'm honestly looking to strike a deal on a computer around 1,100$ or less, so that I'm not taking as much away from my college savings.
Anything that goes over 1k$ makes me grit my teeth wondering if it will be worth it.
If I have to, I'll dish out as much as 1,700$ for a computer.

I'll be using the computer for heavy media production in the line of Music and Animation.

I was looking at Lenovo's Thinkstation desktops... There's the problem of finding the one you want in stock,... there's always a high demand for them.

I do know that the minimum my computer will need is;
64 Bit
Windows 7 Professional
4Gb Ram

I still need to figure out what processors and other chips/cards I'll need.
A friend told me that I should use two Intel Core i3-2120 Processor(3M Cache, 3.30 GHz) instead of a single i5, and that i7 really aren't all that great.

If anyone here can help me find and buy/assemble a computer, I'll be extremely grateful!

go to a specialized shop and tell them how you use your pc: they'll surely be able to tell you how to get it

Quote from DiPi

go to a specialized shop and tell them how you use your pc: they'll surely be able to tell you how to get it

... thanks, I ended up finding a specialist's computer shop, very reasonable people, I can't wait to start animating like a normal person(monster) again.

I work on Acer Aspire 9300 for 3 years now. Works fine to me.

If you need 4GB RAM, I'd suggest this:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Acer-Pentium-Wireless-Windows-Premium/dp/B0045UBCR6

4 GB RAM
446 hard drive space
and some other shit

(this is what I use)
http://www.amazon.com/HP-g6-1a75dx-Multiformat-Built-microphone/dp/B004YTOBEE
beware, HP laptops can be loud.

Why not build a computer, you can get separate pieces for computers at online stores and you can customize it all you want.
My friend did that and he supposedly said it was actually cheaper than an actual computer because of not having a brand.
The problem is that you'll need to know how to make a desktop computer.

iMac + Wacom Tablet, great combination for animating