Solution
an athlon II of any stripe won;t bottleneck a 450, which is at the bottom of midrange cards. Its on a par with a 5770 in power (a little weaker than that, but also $20-30 cheaper)
Here's some cost saving suggestions:

AMD athlon II X3 450: $78.99. Savings: $9.00
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103886

AS Rock 770 Extreme 3 motherboard: $69.99 Savings $0.00, but USB3 and SATA 3.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157195


Sea Sonic 520W 80+ Bronze PSU: $59.99. Savings: $5.00 up front (though no rebate)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151094

the saved $14 can go into a better video card: A GTS 450 from Gigabyte is $114.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125342
 

Stag1928

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Jan 3, 2010
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I like the idea for the PSU and GPU, but the CPU seems like it would create a bottleneck for the GTS 450. AS far as the mobo, i was going to use the first one because it has the 2nd PCI-E slot so if he wants to get some better performance, all he would need is a 2nd video card.