Budget Gaming Build Advice

Jooshway

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Feb 9, 2016
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I'd like to premise this with a few things:

I am a high school student who's age falls below that of the generally accepted employment age. In other words, I'm too young for a consistent job. Money is kinda tight for me, though I make the occasional 30 bucks here and there.

Alright, with that out of the way, I've been putting together a budget gaming PC. Mainly for stuff like TF2, and I'm not really aiming for fantastic performance, just better than that of my old laptop.

It's got an AMD FX-6300, 8 gigs of crucial RAM, and the rest of the specs aren't really that important.

Only thing I have left to purchase is a graphics card. Again, money is tight, so please don't tell me to "just get a gtx 970 instead" because that ain't happening.

I've been looking at the MSI Radeon R7 250. It's a very inexpensive card with some rather impressive specs for the price. I'm wondering, if I want to run something like TF2 at med-high settings, with decent fps, will this card cover me, or am I looking in the wrong place?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

(LINK TO THE CARD)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127763&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction-Components&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-Components-_-Video+Cards+-+AMD%2FATI-_-MSI-_-14127763&cm_sp&AID=11892368&PID=3962334&SID

(holy wall of URL batman)
 
Solution
If all your ever gonna do is play that one game, sure. But what if decide you want to play newer more demanding games? My point is, you can get much more gaming performance going used rather than buying a very low end graphics card. And as N3rdR34ge has suggested, a 750Ti is about the best bang for your buck card out and the cheapest one I would buy if getting a new card.
r7 250 is way too low end at this point. you should invest in at least a gtx 750 ti. its only about a $40 difference for almost double the performance.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-4150 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor ($109.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: MSI H81M-P33 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($44.99 @ NCIX US)
Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($32.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 250GB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($23.95 @ Amazon)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB Video Card ($99.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Cougar Spike MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($33.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Power Supply: XFX XT 400W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($49.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $395.88
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-09 17:24 EST-0500
 
Here's another option since money is tight. The on board graphics for the i3 6100 are pretty good and will play TF2 no problem. Then you can add a better video card at some point down the road.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-6100 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor ($124.89 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: ASRock H110M-DGS Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($52.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill NT Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($39.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Blue 500GB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($38.95 @ Amazon)
Case: Fractal Design Core 1000 USB 3.0 MicroATX Mid Tower Case ($29.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: SeaSonic S12II 520W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($55.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $342.79
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-09 17:33 EST-0500
 

Jooshway

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Feb 9, 2016
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I guess I should've clarified,

I have already purchased the parts I mentioned... So a brand new APU isn't really an option.

Thank you though.
 

Jooshway

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Feb 9, 2016
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If that's the best answer I guess I'll have to.

That leaves me with about a 2 month period without games though XD

((how will I survive **shivers**))
 

Jooshway

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Feb 9, 2016
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if that's the case, yet it has such good reviews (as well as video benchmarks) doesn't that mean that the R7 would be sufficient?
 
If all your ever gonna do is play that one game, sure. But what if decide you want to play newer more demanding games? My point is, you can get much more gaming performance going used rather than buying a very low end graphics card. And as N3rdR34ge has suggested, a 750Ti is about the best bang for your buck card out and the cheapest one I would buy if getting a new card.
 
Solution