Three scenarios pre-builds due to very tight budget (pentium unlocked, A8-7650k or i3?)

Hello masters,

I am doing university and it is expensive. I have only $450 budget (after tax, which is a whop 13% ) So I could only looking for $300 price tag since 150 has been spent on monitor. Luckily I have a HDD and license for the OS so I am just looking for the rest of the parts. I definitely can expand its potential by adding a gpu later on. The potential one would be a R7 265 ~ R9 280/380 or GTX 750 ti ~ GTX 960 series if I could save that much in the future.

Therefore I have such pre-build scenarios. If I picked Pentium G3258 or A8-7650K I have more juice to squeeze in the future, and more heat of cuz, while i3-4170 would be what it is and less heat.

It seems that OCed Pentium beats Athlon 860K (A10-7850K w/o igp) in many games, even in BF4 which favors AMD. (http://www.techspot.com/review/1017-best-budget-gaming-cpu/). However, I have no idea if games in future will ditch dual-core CPUs and favor more cores or threads. Indeed the pentium solution is the cheapest and I could fondle the freq b4 the real beast gpu arrives.

By using A8 I could hold on with some less demanding titles in 720p in medium, if I manage to OC the hell outta the igp and the ram. (Roughly at a level of R7 250 DDR3 or laptop R7 m265) And could wait a bit longer for more powerful gfx.

i3 has more power in gaming compared with the former two and probably the most appropiate if I can afford the gfx at the same time. Well, I still put this into consideration for the pre-build lol.


Any opinions and suggestions are greatly appreciated, esp. on mobo, psu and chassis and see if I cut down the edges too much. I wish to spend less of cuz since Canadian loonies doomed to pesos and some electronic stuffs are 30% more expensive than those in the States. I do want decent quality though.

Here are my thoughts on builds:

I3: PCPartPicker part list: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/DdbJ99
Price breakdown by merchant: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/DdbJ99/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Core i3-4170 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor ($144.75 @ Vuugo)
Motherboard: MSI H81M-P33 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($59.74 @ DirectCanada)
Memory: G.Skill Value 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($51.99 @ Canada Computers)
Case: Cooler Master Elite 361 ATX Mid Tower Case ($45.05 @ Vuugo)
Power Supply: Antec 450W ATX Power Supply ($42.99 @ NCIX)
Total: $344.52
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-08-19 21:54 EDT-0400

A8-7650K: PCPartPicker part list: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/Wxg6zy
Price breakdown by merchant: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/Wxg6zy/by_merchant/

CPU: AMD A8-7650K 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor ($120.98 @ DirectCanada)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-F2A88XM-DS2 Micro ATX FM2+ Motherboard ($69.99 @ Memory Express)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Red 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($62.99 @ NCIX)
Case: Fractal Design Core 1000 USB 3.0 MicroATX Mid Tower Case ($34.99 @ NCIX)
Power Supply: Thermaltake TR2 600W ATX Power Supply ($49.75 @ Vuugo)
Total: $338.70
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-08-19 21:55 EDT-0400


Pentium G3258: PCPartPicker part list: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/LrG8Bm
Price breakdown by merchant: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/LrG8Bm/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Pentium G3258 3.2GHz Dual-Core Processor ($84.99 @ NCIX)
Motherboard: MSI H81M-P33 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($59.74 @ DirectCanada)
Memory: G.Skill Value 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($51.99 @ Canada Computers)
Case: Cooler Master Elite 361 ATX Mid Tower Case ($45.05 @ Vuugo)
Power Supply: Thermaltake TR2 600W ATX Power Supply ($49.75 @ Vuugo)
Total: $291.52
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-08-19 21:57 EDT-0400