I want to start playing around with x86 programming on my spare Linux machine. I've programmed in a different assembly language for a semester (this one) and I'm one of the freaks that enjoys it

I wouldn't mind playing around with x86 programming, but I need to know where to start. I *think* from my knowledge that I can get away with using the following to get started:

Assembler (gnu as?)
Linker (gnu ld?)
Debugger/emulator? (gdb?)

Maybe things like a hex editor and a object file dumper (??) would be pretty handy too?

I want to get pretty serious, much farther than hello world programs. Is there some 'bible' textbook for x86 programming? I probably wont get too far without a good reference book and some online. My teacher says x86 is a huge language and by the sounds of it I cant just learn it from a 'how-to'.

I picked up a copy of 'Designing Embedded Harware' by John Catsoulis (pub. O'Reilly) today, and have had a browse through. I don't claim to have a clue when it comes to assembly, but it's something I'd like to learn myself. The book would be a must for anyone who wants to know the principles behind programming for specific instruction sets (Amtel AVR, Motorola 68000, PIC Micro, etc) and computer architecture, but Catsoulis says the Ported I/O structure of Intel-type processors and the huge instruction set make it difficult, and the book doesn't deal with them. CISC archs ie x86, Pentium may have over 1,000 opcodes.
Shure, you lose power by using C, but it's a hell of a lot easier, and it's portable mostly. Not many applications, save for device drivers, need the raw bit-shuffling power of assembly. With a good C compiler, you don't lose much efficiency.
What do you have in mind by learning assembly? My interest is chiefly because I'm an engineering student.
Certainly the tools you mentioned would be the right ones for the job. I'm curious to find out whether some sort of IDE for Linux is available to streamline the process?

Just found a great website for embedded Linux stuff:
Silicon Penguin
Check it out!

Did you try googling. ???.
here and here are a couple of sites I bookmarked ages ago when I got (semi-)keen.
Never progressed it, but they might start you off. Hitting lists would be the go as well I'd reckon.