Hey Blitzwing,
to the forums!
How did you hear about us?
As others have said, for your budget and for your needs, you can't go past the 8" dob. It's really a great starters scope and will last you a long time.
They're easy to setup, easy to move, and great for beginners.
They are also very adaptable with lots of modifications that you can do to them as starkler eluded to. They're also great because a lot of people have them and there's literally tonnes of information available about them and what modifications you can do. Some of them you'll find on the main site here,
IceInSpace, that I've done to my 10" GSO Dob..
Also while it's mostly true that if you want to do astrophotography you shouldn't get a dob, it
doesn't mean that you
can't do astrophotography with a dob. Check out my
Images page - all of my photos are taken with my 10" dob, either with a webcam or a digicam. So it can be done, it just requires patience and practise.
As starkler and others have said, if you live in dark skies already and won't need to transport it much, the 12" would be best for the aperture, a 10" fits in a car and is on the limit of 1-person portability, but an 8" is good too, and don't feel that you
have to spend more just because we say so.
You'll find that in this hobby, people on forums are always very good at spending other people's money
If you get your scope from Bintel or Andrews (really the only 2 choices), make sure you mention that the guys at IceInSpace referred you.. not that it'll get you any extra discount but we've referred a lot of people there lately and one day it might help us out
Good luck and keep us posted, hope to see you back here regularly.