For your first knife, and partiularly on a budget - go see, and FEEL the knife. One brand that no one has mentioned is CRKT - the make an OK knife, cheap. That said, some of their stuff is junk - and they have cheapened down on their blade steel on some models

I'll buy knives sight unseen, but that is because I can afford to have an hanger queen or 6 hanging around. For quite a while I was only buying customs - sigh - kids put an end to THAT for a while