Originally Posted by m4a1mustang

Here is the budget build that I did for my GF:

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 840 (3.2GHz)
Motherboard: MSI 880G-E45
RAM: 4GB Corsair DDR3-1333(I think?)
HDD: Seagate 1.5TB (bought it before the prices jumped because of the shortage)
GPU: 1GB MSI R6770
Case: Thermaltake mid-tower

We did this for less than $600 and it runs BF3 on High at 1680x1050 with ease.