Is my ASRock 970DE3/U3S3 MOBO a bottleneck for gaming?

[bolowc]

I read this thread with the same mobo, but I have different components, so I thought it would warrant a new thread of my own.

Motherboard: ASRock 970DE3/U3S3 AM3+
CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition 3.4GHz (might be overclocked)
Graphics: MSI Radeon HD 7770 Graphic Card
RAM: 12 GB DDR3 1600 RAM
Power Supply: Corsair Builder Series CX500W

If I can make some nice performance upgrades for $300-500 that would be cool. However, if the performance of a new $600-700ish budget gaming PC will blow that out of the water, I should probably just buy a whole new system. I've listed the main components below to upgrade, and I would like to know if you guys think it's worth it.

CPU: As far as I can tell from the support list, the AMD FX-8300 is the best gaming CPU I can buy?
Graphics: Not sure what I can buy here, but the MoBo is only PCI Express 2.0, not 3.0.
RAM: I will probably buy 2x8GB. Currently I have 3x4GB, and I can't access the last slot due to an aftermarket CPU cooler.
Power Supply: I can upgrade as needed.

Any input would be very much appreciated, since I haven't been following hardware advances in the past several years.

 

[carlo_bigtunes]

the problem is in your motherboard, as long as you use AMD it will be no different to much in higher CPU , there's a limitation speed bus from PCIex to CPU coz an old chip AMD olny support pciex 2.0

if you want to see big different perform, use FM2+ or haswell / skylake not sandy/ivy.
with the same price got different perform..

i'll reccomend min spec for you
haswell i3 4***
B85 chip (minimal)
DRAM use your old one
VGA , VGA is up to you