$500 Gaming Rig Battle Royale

[dave28068]

Please choose between one of the two and let me know why. Also, if any tweaks can be made between the two, let me know. I am curious and I am also shopping myself. Both will run a cosair 430w builder plus psu.

EDIT: I should say that I also have all of the other needed pieces. case/mouse/keyboard/monitor/optical drive and that I am primarily a mmo player however I may be delving into other games such as The Witcher or Battlefield.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($94.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: MSI 970A-G46 ATX AM3+ Motherboard ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Silverline 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1333 Memory ($41.98 @ Outlet PC)
Storage: Seagate Constellation ES 500GB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($55.42 @ Compuvest)
Video Card: Sapphire Radeon HD 7850 1GB Video Card ($154.99 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit) ($89.98 @ Outlet PC)
Total: $507.35
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-03-19 15:11 EDT-0400)

Or this one...

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i3-3220 3.3GHz Dual-Core Processor ($114.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: MSI B75A-G43 ATX LGA1155 Motherboard ($67.49 @ Amazon)
Memory: G.Skill NS 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3-1333 Memory ($32.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 500GB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($57.10 @ Amazon)
Video Card: Sapphire Radeon HD 7770 GHz Edition 1GB Video Card ($94.99 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit) ($89.98 @ Outlet PC)
Total: $457.54
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-03-19 15:11 EDT-0400)

 

[redheat2010]

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/KStF
Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/KStF/by_merchant/
Benchmarks: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/KStF/benchmarks/

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($94.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: ASRock 970 EXTREME4 ATX AM3+ Motherboard ($106.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: Corsair Dominator 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($68.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Seagate Constellation ES 500GB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($55.42 @ Compuvest)
Video Card: Zotac GeForce GTX 660 Ti 2GB Video Card ($277.94 @ SuperBiiz)
Power Supply: Corsair Builder 600W 80 PLUS Bronze Certified ATX12V Power Supply ($49.99 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit) ($89.98 @ Outlet PC)
Total: $744.29
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-03-19 21:18 EDT-0400)

First choice is the better one with some changes

 

[burritobob]

To start off I'm going to address which of the builds is better and what I would change (a minor tweak here and there) to improv performance and save money.

The Latter of the two is the better build for a couple reasons:

The i3 usually eats the Phenom in most benchmarks, it's a great CPU for the money.

You should look into getting 8GB of ram as it is the sweet spot right now, you will never use more than that and it is almost the same price.

The Seagate HDDs are interchangeable I would recommend that you get the one from the 1st.

And finally since you do have a bit of room to spare budget wise you should be able to squeeze in a 7850.

All this put together makes the latter of the two better.

As a side note out of the box with those two, the 1st is better, with the changes I suggested the latter is better.