Upgrade for an old system to play BF3

Hey there,

I'm planing to upgrade my 4 years old PC, I know its very old PC but it does what is supposed to do in terms of gaming(CS source, BF2) and browsing, But I'm 100% sure this PC won't stand against Battlefield 3 requirements, so i really need your help guys to upgrade my PC.

Current Specs:

Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-965P-DS3 LGA 775.
Processor: Intel® Core™2 Duo Processor E6600 (4M Cache, 2.40 GHz).
RAM: CORSAIR XMS2 4GB (4 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2.
Power supply: ENERMAX Noisetaker II 420w.
Video card: GIGABYTE GeForce 7600GT 256MB (...... I know )
HDD: Seagate Barracuda 7200 SATA 250GB + 500GB.
Case: Thermaltake Tsunami Dream.

All I want is to play Battlefield 3 when it comes out, and my budget is around 650$. What do I have to upgrade?

I think you have 2 options here, cheaply upgrade the graphics to something like a HD 6850, overclock the CPU (With a cooling upgrade) and get a better PSU (~550W) or just build a whole new PC.

Heres a suggestion for the latter:

Intel Core i5 2500k
2x2GB G.SKILL Ripjaws X 1600Mhz
Gigabyte/ASUS/MSI/ASRock P67 Motherboard
COOLER MASTER eXtreme Power Plus RS-550
If you can up your budget by around $30 you can get a GTX 560Ti (Fermi) which is excellent value, if not go for HD 6850 or GTX 460

Pretty sure BF is CPU intensive (as well as GPU) so the i5-2500k is a great idea. In my opinion it is worth keeping your current case and HDD's in favour of GTX 560Ti and i5-2500k.

Another alternative would be to get a Q6600 CPU, HD 6850 and ~550W PSU. This would be pretty cheap right now but in the long run the i5 is going to be a lot better.

EDIT: If youre not an overclocker you can save on the CPU by dropping down to i5-2400 and you could get a cheaper motherboard.

Sorry ive been away for the weekend, but no probs. I think it's safe to say the i5-2400/GTX 560 will be a over the recommended spec for BF3.

Just so you know, only get the 'k' model if youre overclocking, if not just get the 2400. Its way cheaper and pretty much the same performance at stock.

The ASUS P8P67 PRO is a great board but just unnecessary unless you want/need SLI. I would go for a cheaper P67 motherboard.

As for those GPU's, ive heard many good things about that MSI one. Don't get too caught up in the idea of buying a pre overclocked card because graphics overclocking is very easy.

Funny, but I am running the same mobo, same amount of memory, and had the 7600GT until it died on me a year or so ago. But, I'm running the E6300, but have it clocked up a bit.

I've been playing BF2BC and am just starting to gather my parts in anticipation for BF3.

I went with the Asus P8P67 Pro, i5 2500K, and 8 GB of memory.

I am currently using a GTX460 1GB card (lifetime warranty, due to my failed 7600GT, figured why not), and I plan to upgrade my OCZ 600W PSU later this year if/when I SLI, though the single card might be good enough (supposedly it's a great overclocker, and easy to do on this GPU).

Also, I bought some Samsung F3 drives last year, and these things are really quite fast, but I am considering a SSD, but that too might wait until later in the year.

I got what I consider very good pricing on my components so far, but I may have a good 500W PSU coming to me (part a car/computer/reloading equipment trade I am doing), that I won't have much use for.

I bought an E6300 a few years ago, and now I wish I could overclock the CPU with the multiplier. My point is that you even though you don't think you want to oc today, you may want to play with it in a couple of years.

I just purchased my i5 2500K from Micro Center for $179, plus tax.