All of those games are playable on the 6870 with a little tweaking here and there. Turn off certain GPU heavy settings and bam you get 30+fps. The key word in the OP is cheap. A lot of people dont have the cash for such luxuries of 60fps gaming.
But the OP said his target is 40-60fps at 1920x1080 that does not jive well with budget either. I say going on his current idea try to budget about $100 more and go for the FX-8320 and a 7870 Tahiti LE http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202024&IsVirtualParent=1 but even a regular 7870 would be good. BTW I stand by my previous post in the OP's situation the 6870 is weak.
I agree with loophole, and that post with the fps were avg, the min fps would be far lower than the average. the 6870 is old midrange, slower than an even older even 5870 http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/540?vs=511 the op was asking for opinions after all
That rig will be fine for gaming. Overclock both the CPU and GPU and you will be golden. Its very similar to my rig and I can tell you from experience - everything is playable at med-high settings with absolutely playable fps.
I agree! HD 7850 is the way to go. I couldn't find any 6870 on newegg that's still selling to price match against each other, but I was able to get a Sapphire 1GB HD7850 for $169.00 (and it comes with TombRaider and Bioshock Infinite promotion) for my building my brother's AMD rig. Rough idea of 6870 vs 7850 (anandtech) GPUboss' comparison
I most certainly would not put a Radeon 6870 into a NEW computer. You would def not be hitting 60 fps in a lot of games at 1080p. I have a Radeon 6870 in another computer but the monitor it's hooked up to is only 1280x1024 not 1920x1080. Sure it works pretty good on an old low res monitor but I would feel pretty underwhelmed using it at 1080p and you will most certainly be lowering your graphics settings to maintain 60fps.
Thanks a lot guys for the reply. Sorry for not being able to post a reply immediately. Been busy with work and other stuff. With all the replies ive read now im a bit more confused on what to get. Just to clarify can I play new games with med to high settings or just even med settings with no problem? Or would it be better to add in a few more cash to get a 7000 series card? If i get the 7000 series card do I still go along with the current mobo and cpu? or do I get a better one?
Your aiming for 1080 I would save a bit more cash and get a 2GB 7850 or 7870 its more future proof because of the VRAM. Current mobo and cpu that you are getting will get you by with the cards I listed fine.
If id go for a lower resolution like 760 with the 6870 would I get a decent FPS? And ive come up with this Gigabyte GA-990FXA-D3 AM3+ is this better than the one I listed? And will the 8320 be significantly better than the 6300?
Yes but you would still be limited by the VRAM in newer games with the new consoles coming out with a sh!t load of GDDR5 onboard you may run into a memory limit with only 1GB. That mobo is better it uses the 990fx chipset that is the top of the line AMD AM3+ chipset very nice and lots of features. You will notice the difference in highly multithreaded games like BF3, Crysis2/3, and in encoding software that is multithreaded like handbrake. That and the new consoles are using a 8 core CPU so it may be more future proof. For the small difference in money it's almost a no-brainier.
So which is it? MOBO: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-D3 AM3+ GPU: RADEON 7850 CPU: FX-8320 Or go for an OC of MOBO: ASRock 970 Extreme 4 CPU: FX-6300 GPU: RADEON HD6870
CPU side yes OC vs Stock should be very comparable maybe even a little faster in some places. On the GPU side however no http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/540?vs=549 BTW I think you get a few free games with the 7850.
First one easy. Another option would be to save a few bucks by getting the bottom system with the 7850, lol! I don't doubt you'd be happy with a 6300 and a 7850. Check around for sales on the FX processors, as there is a good chance you can find a killer deal on at least one of the two. I've seen cases where the 8320 was only $30 more than the 6300.