Time for an upgrade

[Mac K]

Disclaimer: I have little to no knowledge about PCs.

My current PC still gets me by, I can play Rfactor, GTR2, iRacing, etc with no problems. However, some newer games such as Assetto Corsa, Project Cars, Dirt Rally, etc I struggle to play or can't even play at all. I still use Windows XP as my OS, so I already plan on upgrading that along with a new HD. I'm looking for opinions on what to do, my budget is fairly limited so I'm thinking of upgrading components in my PC that really need to be upgraded and leaving some that I might be able to get away with. I'll post my current specs, followed by what I've been researching and shopping around for to replace certain parts.

OS: Windows XP
HD: 200 GB Seagate
Processor: AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+
Motherboard: ASUS M2N68-AM PLUS
Power Supply: Thermaltake TR2-430
Video Card: ATI Radeon 3800 Series

And now what I'm thinking of upgrading too or keeping..

OS: Windows 7 or 8.1
HD: 1 or 2 TB Seagate
Processor: AMD FX-6300 3.5 GHz
Motherboard: ASUS M2N68-AM PLUS? (This is any area I'm not sure of)
Power Supply: Thermaltake TR2-430
Video Card: ATI Radeon 3800 Series? (Another area I'm not sure of)

Thoughts?

 

[Techy]

OS: Windows 7 or 8.1
HD: 1 or 2 TB Seagate
Processor: AMD FX-6300 3.5 GHz
Motherboard: ASUS M2N68-AM PLUS? (This is any area I'm not sure of)
Power Supply: Thermaltake TR2-430
Video Card: ATI Radeon 3800 Series? (Another area I'm not sure of)

OS: Looks good.
HDD: Looks good. Consider an SSD, maybe a Samsung 850 Evo.
Processor: If you want to stay with AMD, go with a FX-8350. However Intel offers much better gaming performance, especially in titles like PCARS.
Motherboard: Comes down to what features matter to you. Do you want Wi-FI built-in? A thousand USB ports? Want to do SLI/Crossfire? Want to overclock?
Power Supply: I'm not very good at this category. Hopefully someone will come around to help with this.
Video Card: Depends. If you want to run all those games at High settings 1080p 60fps, get a GTX 970 or better. Or an AMD R9 280X / AMD R9 380 or better.

 

[Grayfox]

OS: Cant argue with windows 7
HDD: 2TB should do you fine
SSD: You should consider this for the OS drive if you have the money
CPU: I cant some much about AMD as I have never used them and I personally do not like AMD
Mainboard: These range from the basic entry level things with little features to high end ones with every feature out their and good overclocking abilities, Only get the high end ones with high end CPUs
PSU: Get a PSU that has about 40% more power than you need.
GPU: These are like CPUs, 2 brands lot of choice that can depend on what you want
Case: The main part of any PC build is the case, It must have good airflow, so this rules out the generic cheap POS units, your case must also be big enough to hold the mainboard and have the room for the large parts like GPU.

 

[TiZzla]

CPU: I have been using an FX6300 for the past 3 years and I would recommend you go with an intel i5 if your budget can stretch a bit.
GPU: GTX 960 will run pretty much anything on high settings at 60fps+, go with a 970 if you want to run ultra.
OS: Get win 8.1 or 10, massive gaming performance gains compared to win7.

As for the other parts it depends on your budget, try to get higher quality parts if you can. Also 8gb of ram should be plenty.

 

[Ranman20]

What is your budget, I can make you a spreadsheet on pcpartpicker.com

 

[acascianelli]

How much system RAM are you looking at for the new setup? I'd also recommend going for the FX8350 over the FX6300 if you're going to stay with AMD. Maybe look into an FX8370E too, it has a lower base clock speed than the FX8350, but it should be faster under load.