Questions on a new pc, please help!

Hi everyone :)

So, my video card got fried because the fan somehow blocked. It was very old (radeon hd 3600) and I was actually waiting for something to break so I could have an excuse to change pc.
A friend of my cousin's is selling an hd 7870 for 80€ (I know it's 3 years old, but it cost 350€ at the time) and I was hoping to build a pc with it and adding about other 250-350€.

I'm not a fan of overclocking because you have to care for temperature, use premium cases and materials and so on, and I'm always out of money (I have two case fans tied with twines right now XD). So I don't need an extremely powerful pc, just something which lets me play decently at high settings Path of Exile, Diablo 3, Starcraft 2, Battlefield 3, Crysis 2, Grim Dawn, Tomb Raider, and many other games I was postponing playing because they ran bad on my old crappy pc.

For the cpu, I was told the am3 fx-8320, since it's powerful and cheap, and I'll definitely take it.

For the memory, I think 2 x 4gb may be enough for now, but I don't know about the speed. How much does it change, in terms of speed and power consumption, ddr3 1600mHz or ddr3 2400mHz? What do you recommend?

For the motherboard, I don't know anything. I see motherboards which cost 40€ and ones that go up to and above 150€. They all look the same to me. I'd like to stay on a 50-60€ one, any advice?

Maybe I'll have to buy a new psu because mine is 500w one (welly pro wpa-a500) and doesn't have the cables for the additional power supply for the video card. Any suggestions? Something on 40-50€ can do?

Sorry for the long post. Can you help me? Thank you!

My old system is still an AMD Phenom 965 and my GFX card is a 7850 and it still stomps POE on almost max settings (I use low shadows) just fine.

AMD 7850 is fine.

If you play starcraft 2 really a lot you need to take an Intel CPU because it just uses two cores with a high performance per clock.

AMD offers more cores but way weaker performance per clock and higher power consumption. The FX cpus and the AM3+ mobos have not been updated since 2012. Therefore their are very cheap but it is really questionable to build a new system now with this. Don't combine a 125 TDP eight-core FX and a cheap AM3+ mobo, you will get problems with stability and cooling.

The best FX options are the FX 6300 or FX 6350 and a AM3+ mobo with 970 chipset. You will need an aftermarket cooler however, because the cooler that comes with the FX cpu (if you buy a boxed version) is to loud under load.

AMD has a second platform: FM2+ and their APUs, cpus with integrated graphics. These cpus and mobos are more up to date but their are limited to four cores and you pay for the integrated graphics even it you will never use them because you have a extra gpu. However there is a FM2+ cpu without integrated graphics, the cheap Athlon X4 860k. This with a FM2+ mobo with A78 or A88X chipset is the best low budget option out there.

For more money the best option is the Intel i5 4460, the cheapest up to date four core from Intel. This four core is as fast the FX eigh-cores if it comes to gaming and will use half the power and will use the up to date Intel 1150 mobos (H97 or Z97 chipset). You can also use the stock cooler, however a after market cooler is always the quietest option.

The faster Intel i5 or i7 are not worth for your basic needs.

For the RAM take 2x4 GB DDR3 with 1866 speed.

if you really want good pc advice, I would recommend you log in to cyberpowerpc forums, that is where I had my computer custom built and the forums are run by users, not salesmen. they are very up on the latest components and what is compatable with what.

I would recommend a video card with at least 2gb of graphics on it and an i5 processor with operating speed over 2gbs. also I would recommend a mobo that will handle 8 gb ram or more so if you don't have 8 yet, you can upgrade to it later. if it is a desk model I would recommend a 240m or 360 instead of the 120s a lot of ppl use, if you use 120s set them up on push pull configuration.

Thank you very much for your answers! Sorry if I haven't written for some days.

Based on the information you (and others) gave me, I've come to these components:
- Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3P [80€]
- Corsair Vengeance 8GB PC3-12800 1600MHz (1x8GB) [48€]
- Thermaltake London 550W ATX 80+ Gold [80€]
- AMD FX-8320 or AMD FX-6350 (still to be chosen) [147€ or 130€]
-> total (incl. s/h) = 364€ or 347€. 80€ more for the hd 7870.

I hear 8 cores are not useful for gaming so maybe I'll stick with the FX-6350, which has a higher clock and costs a bit less. Intel's i5s and i7s are way too expensive, even considering how much you can save on your power bills.
I don't play much Starcraft 2, but I've played it decently on my old Intel Core 2 Duo E4600 @2,4ghz, so I think the AMD one will handle it. What I'm more interested in, is PoE and the other games I said earlier. I don't think I own any AAA game which came out after 2013, that's why I don't need an exceptional (and too expensive) pc.

Once I'll see my cousin's friend and get the video card, I'll order the other components and I'll let you know! I will however read any of your comments in the meanwhile.