Please help a new player with opening strategies...

What map size do you play?
You should probably start churning out colony ships immediately: You have 1000bc, so you can expend more than you make for a while. You should either use a higher military spending (even 100% can work on normal till you have a few ships) or lease-buy one or two colony ships. Then you should go for impulse drives after diplomacy, since your ships will move faster. Also, send scouts to find the yellow stars. The ai knows where they are, you don't.

I usually play medium sized galaxies; I've tried Large in hopes of having more space to myself and thus more colonies, and that has worked to some degree... but still not as much as I'd liked.

~SDC~

At medium and smaller I would spend all your cash purchasing colony ships: got to get there first. (On larger maps, I would never purchase: I need to settle more planets...)

In terms of your development process, DONT build the manufacturing plant at the beginning - its main effect is to increase your industrial capacity (max you could produce in a turn) not your actual production: actual production comes from economy (ie taxes etc), up to the max of your industrial capacity.

Consider either taking speed or sensor bonuses - or get to and build the grav accel trade good / the eyes wonder - since fiding and getting to the stars is your concern.

~SDC~

I disagree. On Small & Tiny maps, I trounce the AI on "Intelligent" without rush-buying a single ship. You should think long and hard before rush-buying because it is so much more expensive.

I rush-study to Diplomacy, change my government and change to 100% social spending for Diplomatic Translators.

In the meantime, my survey ship is exploring the galaxy and making contact with the other races. If I happen to be in the center of the galaxy, I will purchase a scout ship (fairly cheap) to speed up the contact process.

I trade the Translators for any techs I don't have (except Defense Theory) and also for tons of cash.

Then I shift back to 100% research to get to Aprodisiacs and repeat the process.

By the time I have built the two trade goods under Nano-Metals, all of the other Civs are broke and I have all their money and techs.

I build a few more trade goods (for future sales to keep them in debt) and then run the table once my manufacturing is built up.

It's rare for me to have a game nowadays where I do not build all of the trade goods and wonders. There's nothing magical about it; the AI just pays a ton for trade goods but doesn't rush to get them before you.

Here's my personal strategy:

-Research Comm Theory, UTs, Diplomacy, then Trade.
-The second you go to the Earth control screen, buy another Colony Ship(it's like 730 bc, but I think it's worth it)
-Colonize like crazy, going for Class 15s or better.
-Colonize other, crappier planets for better range.
-Never, ever, ignore a message. (I got one about evil building up on Sander I in my first game, a little while later...yeah.)

For what it's worth:
Speed +2 Bonus
Econ +2 Party

I have submitted three games, the last one at Normal. All under 1000 points (:(

Current game is on Challenging level - Huge - Loose Clusters
100 % Military to build Colony and a few scounts
Earth colony ships only loaded 100 mil.

Expand, Expand, Expand. (Absolute Key to this game)

With new planets, set for colony ships.

Sense when Expansion is ending, open up research (not social, nothing to build yet) I went straight to impulse (then communications) to aid the final rush to the last planets.

Key to all of this ... after a while not all planets need to build colony's and what else to build? Constructors, because you are "storing" the production.

In my current game, I paused as the last planets were being claimed and noticed I was almost dead last in all catagories excpet for the number of systems (which no one tracks). The trick was now to "look big".

At this point, someone started a war with the weak humans and someone else wanted to extort money for peace.

I set research slider to make sure I got what ever I wanted in one turn, went straight to Corvette (SP), changed prduction to 50 military, and 25 in the others, and changed 60% of the constructors to Corvette. Few turns later, my military graph shot up and everyone left me alone and the race at war, paid for peace (gawd I love that).

Now, with the number of planets, I'm number one except in $$ and Im pausing again. My research is not focused and the two races that bugged me early in the game are bowing to my military.

However, whats next? Last night I mapped the research way to Star Base Culture Max and will start the process of churning out constructors for a culture war against some friendly races while the grunts do their star wars thing.

Again ... for what its worth.
Two BIG tips:
Speed to expand
Know how to get what you want - know your research tree.

This game is so full of different ways to play. Also Isuspect the AI is getting a PQ bonus at this level, which is cool...

On normal difficulty (all AIs normal), large maps...

I don't know how cheesy it is to suggest restarting locations if you don't like what you see, but I usually do this.

First turn: 0% spending, tax as high as possible (keep morale to 60% so you don't stunt pop growth too much); buy first colony ship (730bc). Survey goes one way, colony ship goes the other. I try to send these at sectors with at least 2 systems. They go to sectors at the edge of my range. Colony ship finds a yellow star, I colonize it.

Subsequent turns: 100% spending, 90% military, 10% research. Research propulsion or diplomacy. This should crank out colony ships every 2 - 3 months. Each colony ship I send to a different sector to find my borders. This was a good tip I picked up here in the forums myself. Each colony ship I put 75 population, no more than 100.

Once borders have been established (i.e., I have seen and/or colonized as much yellow stars as I can reach), I even out the ratio of military/research/social a little bit. This starts me off usually as a weak small empire but with many systems. By mid game it turns around.