I am thinking of getting either knights of the old republic 1 or 2 because I recently was given an xbox. Which is the better game to get? Please help; I know the second has faults in the story, but doesn't it make up for that in graphics and combat (compared to the first one)?

To be honest, 1 and 2 are identical save the plot line. I played and completed both of the games several times, and would say that if you only want one, it doesn't really matter which you choose but both of them are fantastic and would recommend both.

kotor 1 is my 2nd all time fav game, designed by the excellent bioware corp. i was stuck in the star wars universe for a week the first time i played the game. i played it the entire day and then went to sleep, then repeated. It even entered conversations with people, "i beat manaan today!"
kotor 2 was not done by bioware, but done by obsidian entertainment. they did an excellent job, improving little things here and there, but they were rushed by lucas arts and the ending is abrupt. otherwise an excellent game with a lot of small subtle improvements over the first one. the plot is not as good as the first one, but, if not for the abrupt ending, it would have a very good story.
like mike said they're similar but at this point i would get both since they're both $20 now.
if you just want one, get the first one.

Well they both OWN as hell! so i would buy both lol as theyr reasonably cheap as the 360 is out now. Thats another thing..360 version of KOTOR would be great

Kor1 has a HUGE plot twist and it's mentioned early on in Kor2. So my advice is to play Kor1. It takes quite a while to play (60+ hours if you play as a light side player then a dark side player.) The game is somewhat easy to follow through and when I first played it I only got stuck on a few minor things. After you've played Kor1, save up to play Kor2. The plot isn't as twisted, but the features are a lot better.

One final thing, both games tend to have annoying glitches, so save often and in different slots.

kotor 1 is a lot better imo. but then again i loved the storyline more than anything.