Yeah, that's what happens a lot. :)
Still, pretty neat how you managed to go over the original budget by only about $50.

Asus used to be higher end brand and Asrock lower, but I'm not sure how they compare these days and definitely not how these particular mobos compare.

Just go and get one or the other, you'll be happy! :D

The only thing to realize beforehand, those won't make for a whisper quiet machine.
You're hitting around 300W power draw, which makes for some fan noise. Shouldn't be terrible or anything,
just something it's good to keep in mind.

It's like I'm looking through things, and I see something like, "Oh, man, that thing has X. But, oh, man, that one has Y. Would you look at that one! It has X, Y, and Z! But it costs a small fortune!"
It's difficult to choose.

I think my knowledge in regards to the pricing of computers isn't the best (yet) either. I was honestly only expecting to spend about $400, but then I realized that, as I went on, if I wanted to get something that would meet my needs and usage, I'd probably need to put a bit more into it. Didn't necessarily think it would be ~$670 or so, but I think this is a good midpoint for what I had originally planned in pricing along with what I wanted (The HD7950 build earlier in the thread that was, what? $850 or something?). It'll be a good balance.

My main thing is the size of the ASRock mobo. It seems a bit cramped and lacks some things that would be nice if I wanted to beef things up in a few years without switching out the whole computer. I had a Gigabyte one, as well, that was pretty cheap, but it had the same cramping issues. I think the Asus mobo will serve me well, though.

Alright. I don't think it will be too much of a bother.
As long as I can still hear myself think.
Thankfully, I have a good set of headphones to help with that as well. :)

Note that I just jumped in, and I'm referring to the build posted in the first post, but skimming the rest of the thread I'm not sure if that's up to date.

I have a Phenom II X6 1090T, and I had to buy an aftermarket cooler because the bundled one was terribly noisy and inadequate for the 125W CPU. I Imagine that could be a problem with the 125W Phenom II X4, too. (It wasn't with the 95W Phenom II X3 I had before.) It looks to me like a Core i3 or FX 4300 will be a better choice at the budget end.

One other place where I feel you're definitely not future proof is the amount of RAM. I'd say that 8GB is a minimum. Next gen consoles are rumoured to have 8GB, and PC games will certainly be able to use more than 4GB (Crysis 3 high performance setup is 8GB).

Yeah, sorry about my first post not being up to date.
This is the current most build.

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/xI44

It includes a cheaper ASUS mobo, 8 GB of RAM, and a FX-6300.
I'm not sure if the cooler with the FX-6300 is adequate enough, though.
It's 95W.

I'll update my first post so people aren't confused.
I made these changes after suggestions from Jarmo and forgot to update it.

Can't say. The Phenom II X3 was 95W and its cooler was good enough. Maybe some googling could tell you if it's adequate, although enthusiast sites probably use a custom cooler for reviews, so those might not be of much help.

At this CPU price the FX-6300 is a toss-up with the Core i3 in terms of gaming performance. Intel's benefit is a much lower power consumption.

i3 has a kind of benchmark illusion going for it.

i3 wins a 4-6 core AMD handily in all tests where the game isn't properly multithreaded, but in those cases both processors would be good enough.
i3 loses a bit in heavily multithreaded cases, and those are where the high requirement games are going to be.

It was the same thing way back when fast 1-core processors hold against 2-core alternatives in benchmark stats, but still give crappy performance in new games.

The cooler will be [i]
adequate[/i] at least, might run noisy and hot and not give good overclock headroom, but it's not going to overheat/crash/burn. Having said that though, I had my 125W processors stock cooler swapped, this resulting in 20 degrees lower temperature and quieter operation.

Two of my friends have built a couple of rigs (for themselves and for friends or relatives) and both have always used ASRock motherboards because they're reliable and good value for money. I only discovered this after I had blown two ASUS P8P67 LE's in five months, which was pretty amazing. I've now had a comparable ASRock for over a year with no problems. I know both marques make motherboards by the bucketload, so these few cases aren't much to go by. Make of them what you will.

I'd imagine the fan will spin for dear life under load and the temperatures will still be on the high side, although not critical. Try it out first, see how it performs. If it's unsatisfactory, the Hyper 212 or a roughly similar cooler can be picked up for about thirty bucks, so it's unlikely to make you go bankrupt.

For future reference, processors have a Tjmax temperature, often somewhere around the 100°C mark; if your temps hit that, the software will throttle your CPU or shut down the system to prevent heat damage. People seem to agree that you're fine if your temps stay 20°C under Tjmax.

I currently have a 6100, its also 95W and it runs very cool with the stock cooler(last time I checked) (just looked. Bios shows 32C after general use, and some monitor program I'm not trusting is saying 25C)

I've had several other AMD CPU's historically, and I've always gotten away with the stock cooler. Granted I'm not an over clocker by nature. If you have plans on doing that then that's different.

I wouldn't worry to much about the tom's hardware people trying to talk you into higher priced items. Many of them are probably hardware geeks that are too busy trying to be cutting edge within their personal hobby to wrap their mind around the idea that what they want isn't necessarily what someone else needs or will be happy with. Or that something practical often can do 85-90% of the work for half the price. My ex-sister in law financed a $1200+ i7 computer with a serious gaming card so she could watch internet TV and play Rollercoaster Tycoon. It's a nice computer, but it's a waste on her, and I don't think she would have gone that big if her father wasn't the enthusiast he is.

If you are wanting to game, just get a solid CPU and worry more about the GPU. Though its sounds like you just about have it all sorted out.

Let me remind not to recommend Tom's Hardware anymore.

About the PS3 controller, I suggest to try it first, you can always go out and buy an XBox360 pad.
Personally I prefer the PS3 over the XBox pad, but I never tried the PS3 on a PC.
You might even be better of by buying a logitech XBoxlike gamepad, they're generally cheaper and it has better software support for PC usage, which for an XBox pad you have to rely on 3rd party programs.

Well, I ended up rephrasing my question at Tom's Hardware to make it as precise as possible. In doing so, I managed to get a better recommendation from there (I'll take the blame for my previous attempt since I was bit vague). They managed to come up with this as a build:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: AMD FX-6300 3.5GHz 6-Core Processor ($129.99 @ Microcenter)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-970A-DS3 ATX AM3+ Motherboard ($77.55 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Blackline 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($35.57 @ NCIX US)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($64.99 @ NCIX US)
Video Card: XFX Radeon HD 7870 2GB Video Card ($204.99 @ NCIX US)
Case: Cooler Master Elite 370 ATX Mid Tower Case ($36.39 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: Corsair Builder 500W 80 PLUS Bronze Certified ATX12V Power Supply ($51.98 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224BB/RSBS DVD/CD Writer ($19.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $621.45
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-01-16 10:20 EST-0500)

It's honestly really similar to the one I have.
Really, it seems that the main difference is, more or less, a toss up between whether I want the HD7870 or the GTX 660.
Although, that's probably something I'll just have to decide on my own.

I'd like to thank you all again.
I'll have to so some more googling, but I think I'm well set.

If I have any questions at a later date ("Why did my computer explode when I put it together?"), I'll ask, but I think I'm good for now.

Really appreciate all of the help, everyone. :)

I don't suppose there is a microcenter physically near you? They discount motherboards 40$ if you buy a CPU from them in store. I recently got my 6100 with a motherboard and 4GB of ram for 141$ after taxes and I could have mailed in a 10$ rebate which would have made the MoBo free (which would have actually been a total of 60$ in that case).

If anyone is physically near them have a look
http://www.microcenter.com/site/products/amd_bundles.aspx

Nah, there isn't.
I live pretty close to the middle of nowhere.
I mostly just copy/pasta'd the BBCode one just for the parts.
It'll be a bit more expensive online, but I can deal with it.

That is a really good deal, though.

Hmm...
Apparently the mobo I chose, the Gigabyte GA-970A-DS3, isn't very nice for overclocking the CPU due to it having a 4+1 phase count and no heatsinks on the VRMs.
I wouldn't mind trying to push my FX-6300's performance a bit more, but I'm not sure if I should even bother.
I was planning on nabbing a Hyper 212 EVO, but I'm not sure if I should bother if I can't/shouldn't overclock it.
Can't really find any tips on this mobo either, other than "yeah, just get a new mobo."

Not saying that I want to get a new mobo or that this one is bad.
I'm just wondering if I should put down the money for a cooler if I can't/shouldn't really utilize it regardless.

Have you already ordered the Mobo then? If so then maybe skip it for now. You could always get a new cooler later, though I hate taking them off as its always a little scary. I know the CPUs are built with OC in mind but maybe you could just try your new rig out and see how happy you are with it.

I've personally always avoided OC. I just want my parts to last so I try to be as nice to them as I can, though I got the feeling AMD almost expects you to with the latest lineup. Regardless my advice tends to come from a point of being overly cautious. If you are the more daring sort, you could just go for it and if the board goes, well I bet you could fix it.

Hmm...Maybe I should lay off for a while regardless.
I think it would be better to see how it runs first.
I was thinking about trying to push it a bit, but maybe that's something to save until later when the parts are having trouble keeping up.
I might nab the Hyper 212 EVO regardless.
It may come in handy later on.