When I started mining I got help so here's the return.
SHA-256 coins are useless to mine on normal computers, you will make almost nothing and waste money in power. You want to mine Scrypt coins, such as Litecoins. Coinwarz.com tells you which coins are best to mine, but it is volatile, and I recommend Doge coin as it is fairly stable right now. On my 6870 GPU I make about 2k doges a day which amounts to around 0.004 BTC.
Just look up a mining guide and follow the instructions, make sure you are doing it for scrypt coins. I don't have any links, but I use CGMiner (command line) and multipool.us pool. You will also need to optimize your gpu - this info can be found on the litecoin wiki under hardware comparisons (Google this). Lastly, you need graphics card drivers (duh, but I actually forgot this when I did it the first time and it fixed one of my issues).
Hope this helps!
Thanks for the reply.
Script coins is what I was after. I do have a gaming rig with a GTX 670, but I wanted to put a dedicated machine together on the cheap strictly for script mining and possibly coins that can be mined via a CPU? If not, I have read the AMD 7950 is good for mining? I want to avoid spending too much tbh, but I am realistic as to what I could mine, thats why I wanted to mine and hoard any coins going.
Ps, are you referring to normal graphics card drivers or special ones for mining?