Help on build

[TrevorDTate]

My friend is looking to get a pc for gaming. His budget he is looking to spend is $500. Any good builds that could rival a console at that price?

 

[DzOnIxD]

My answer is you ask to your friend Keep Money save in $800 and Build A PC gaming.

Agreed, 800-900$ is the sweet spot for gaming pc

 

[herrwizo]

Without monitor, OS and peripherals, this is basically as far as you can go for slightly above $500 in terms of gaming performance:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-4160 3.6GHz Dual-Core Processor ($109.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI H81M-P33 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($42.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($53.49 @ Directron)
Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon R7 260X 2GB Video Card ($119.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case ($47.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($53.99 @ NCIX US)
Optical Drive: Asus DRW-24F1ST DVD/CD Writer ($15.89 @ OutletPC)
Total: $514.31
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-16 07:47 EDT-0400

For $800 you can get i5 and a much more powerful graphics card + an SSD for a system drive.

 

[LucoTF]

Couldn't rival a console if you include windows:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Pentium G3258 3.2GHz Dual-Core Processor ($63.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: MSI H81M-P33 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($42.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($54.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($53.49 @ Directron)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 750 1GB Video Card ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Enermax OSTROG ATX Mid Tower Case ($39.99 @ Directron)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($53.99 @ NCIX US)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 - 64-bit (OEM) (64-bit) ($92.00 @ B&H)
Total: $501.42
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-16 07:56 EDT-0400