Lightboost is pretty damn awesome. However, Nvidia has released g-sync which will force your monitor to refresh when it receives frames from the GPU which is the only thing to currently consider when looking at monitor/graphics cards upgrades. AMD's Mantle looks promising sure, but g-sync will finally make your monitor work as it should do. It's highly likely that g-sync will only work with Nvidia GPUS (and only GTX650 and above) so I wouldn't buy an R9 tier GPU at the moment, especially considering their prices are very inflated at the moment due to massive demand from bitcoin mining.

Thanks for the advice. I think I'm going to go with this card, then.
Is it worth it for me to save up for a 4670k rather than use an AMD CPU? That would also add the cost of an upgraded mobo and a CPU cooler, right?

This has been confirmed

Then I want to say thank you EVGA for sending me a 650TI, when I RMA'ed a 560TI

An 8350 overclocked would get you about the same mileage (maybe a little less) as a 4670k overclocked in games because games these days are very rarely CPU bound, but the 4670k is just a better CPU overall. Personally I'd get a 4670k (or a 4670 if you don't want to/can't overclock), especially if you've got TF2 in mind since TF2 will make good use of the CPU and wants good single threaded performance over multiple threads meaning that the 4670k is definitely a better choice for TF2.

Is the extra cost of getting an unlocked CPU, in your opinion, worth it? I mean, if I'm playing mainly source games, I don't think I should have to blow $1000 just to get stable 240 fps or whatever it would need to be with the 144hz monitor.

The cost of an unlocked processor is like $10-20 more? Add on a bit more assuming you need beefier cooling and you're probably up to $60 more which is quite significant. Overclocking these days really doesn't get you much benefit at all, maybe a few FPS but it's nice to have the option to overclock. If you don't already have fairly beefy cooling planned (especially for Haswell which gets very hot), or adding cooling like that would take you out of your budget, and you don't really have any interest in learning how to overclock then I wouldn't bother. If you enjoy tinkering with hardware then go for it because it's pretty fun to see what extra performance you can get. Also you're fine with 120fps for 144hz, although 120hz+lightboost is better and g-sync is better than that and with g-sync you'd be locked to 144fps anyway.

G-sync caps your fps at 144? If that's the case, would it be necessary for me to buy a 4670 when I could get something cheaper that runs the game at 144fps? An FX-6300 or 6350 could do that, and I could OC either of those some if I needed to.
Thanks for the help, by the way!

Here's my build in a few days (same as before with some new stuff):

CPU: Intel i5 Ivy Bridge 3570K (clocked at 3.4 GHz)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO
RAM: G.SKILL Sniper Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3 1866 RAM
Motherboard: ASRock Z77 Extreme4
Video Card: HIS H687F1G2M Radeon HD 6870
Sound Card: ASUS Xonar DG
SSD: OCZ Agility 3 120GB
HDDs: Maxtor 320GB, Seagate Barracuda 1 TB
Monitor: ASUS VG248QE
Secondary Monitor: Envision H19W Headphones: Sennheiser HD201
Microphone: Antlion Modmic v1
Mouse: Razer Deathadder 2013
Keyboard: Dynex Wired Keyboard DX-WKBDSL
Webcam: Logitech HD Webcam C270

Was thinking about getting a new keyboard soon as well. I was thinking a 60% to TKL mechanical with brown switches.

I'd also like to upgrade my video card, but that's expensive.

I would also like to have a single-level desk instead of the tri-level one I have now. It's more annoying than anything else, really.

Since g-sync refreshes your monitor when it gets a frame from the GPU and all the g-sync monitors are capped at 144hz (I'm assuming they're using 144hz over 120, if they run at max 120hz then just replace 144 with 120) then there is no need for the fps to go above 144. I'd still get a 4670k if I were you, given that other games would start to struggle with as low as a 6350.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($199.99 @ Microcenter)
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-L9i 57.5 CFM CPU Cooler ($46.72 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($118.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-2133 Memory ($82.05 @ NCIX US)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($59.98 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 760 2GB Video Card ($249.99 @ Microcenter)
Case: Corsair 300R ATX Mid Tower Case ($59.99 @ Microcenter)
Power Supply: Corsair CX 500W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($49.99 @ Microcenter)
Total: $867.69
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-01-02 10:24 EST-0500)
How does this look? Any ways to make this maybe <$800? The $199.99 price for the 4670k is ridiculously amazing. I don't plan to OC much (or at all if it seems to difficult or like I'm going to break it), maybe to 4.0-4.2.

The only way I could see of dropping that below $800 is to drop the 4670k. It seems the $199 deal on the 4670k is done now anyway. You generally won't fit a 4670k into an $800 budget, but if you were to go down t a 4670 or a 4570 you could drop the cooler and use a H87 chipset motherboard which would save you a fair amount of money. One thing I notice you don't have is an SSD. Even in an $800 budget an SSD will make a hell of a big difference. I'd recommend just saving a bit longer, just a little bit more money invested here would get you quite a lot more benefits, particularly the 4670k and SSD.

As for your overclocking question, getting 4Ghz out of a 4670k won't be hard at all, it turbos up to 3.8Ghz automatically and this is stable and even the stock cooler can manage the temperatures. Unless you got an unrealistically bad 4670k, 4Ghz would be stable at the same voltage (or maybe a 0.025v increase or so) and the temperatures wouldn't increase too much. As for getting 4.2Ghz out of one, you'd need better cooling to be able to do so comfortably. The NH-L9i is pushing it a bit even for 4Ghz, it's really designed for low heat output small form factor PCs. You can probably find better cooling around the $50 mark quite easily, have a look at some benchmarks.

I can still get the 4670k for $199.99- it's an in-store price at Microcenter. A 4670 would actually cost more than the 4670k, and a 4570 would save me ~$40 for the processor itself, ~$50 for the cooler, and ~$20 for the H87 mobo. That build comes in at $754.97, and would still perform VERY well in TF2 and other games, as far as I can tell. That extra $110 could go towards a mech. keyboard and help me get the new VG248QE sooner, if ever ($399 for the not-yet-released g-sync monitors).

EDIT: If there isn't going to be any real difference in TF2 with the g-sync enabled monitor, then I think I should go with the 4570 build, right
EDIT:Part lists

I'm one paycheck away from ordering the parts for my first build and I've got some noob questions I want to clear up in advance. Do I need to buy an anti-static wristband? Also, what thermal paste should I buy/do I need thermal paste for my cpu? As for case fans, how many do I need? I haven't really chosen a case yet, so I'd be open for suggestions. How many fans need to be pointed inward and how many should be pointed outward/is one orientation more important than the other?

Edit:

This is the build that I'm looking at. Does it check out alright?

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($229.99 @ NCIX US)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($29.98 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z87MX-D3H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($122.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($79.00 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 840 Pro Series 128GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($114.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($59.98 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 760 2GB Video Card ($259.99 @ Microcenter)
Case: Silverstone TJ08B-E MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($64.99 @ Microcenter)
Total: $1061.89
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-01-06 10:06 EST-0500)

[EDIT] Apparently I'm completely wrong and my friends need a little lesson in computer construction. Sorry for misinforming you. Thanks for pointing out my mistakes Platypus and Setsul, I'd hate for a new builder to mess up on his first big build.

Anyways, good luck with your build!

This is not good advice :/ While it's true that you can ground yourself occasionally by doing something like plugging in a metal switched off appliance with a 3 pronged plug and touching it to discharge static, it's ultimately a better idea to just be better safe than sorry. You're spending 1000 dollars on parts, may as well spend 5 dollars to make sure you dont accidentally fry your parts with ESD.

Placing components on either side of a motherboard anti-static bag is a HORRIBLE idea, just place it on top of the motherboard box. This is because while the motherboard is protected quite well inside the bag, it acts as a faraday cage, with the bag being conductive to send electric charge away from the components while they are inside the bag.

As for thermal paste, your hyper 212 evo will come with a tube, and all branded thermal compounds tend to perform within about 1-2 degrees difference, so it's not really a big deal. If you want to buy new thermal paste, I'd reccomend Prolimatech PK-1 or Noctua NT-H1, both are relatively easy to apply and perform well. People really should not buy AS5 any more, as it is electrically conductive, so if you accidentally get any on your motherboard, you can short it, while the 2 i mentioned are both not electrically conductive, so you dont need to worry about it.

#105
You'll be fine without an anti-static wristband if you take a few precautions:
Ground yourself before you start building or even unboxing. Touching an uncoated pipe of a radiator (or anywhere else where you could ground a wristband) is the preferred method.
Don't wear clothes with too much plastic in them.
Don't build on a carpet, use a table or any other clean, flat and non-conductive surface.
If you have touched something that is conductive or might have been electrostatically charged, ground yourself again.
I tend to wear shoes with rubber soles (no nails in them) that won't charge up even on carpet, but that's just me being too lazy/forgetful to wear an anti-static wristband and at the same time being afraid of killing hardware worth a few grand.

You can add one fan to the TJ08B-E but the temps should be fine with the one included fan, because it's a relatively small case.

The Fractal Design Core 1000 or 3000 are pretty good, cheap mATX cases.

There's thermal paste included with the 212 Evo and it's actually decent, you really don't need a better one.

#106
Anti-static bags only protect stuff inside the bag, even if you turn them inside out they don't do shit* if you put hardware on top of them.

*well they do if your workplace is the source of the charge, but then your hardware is getting fucked sooner or later anyway.

The thermal paste that comes with the 212 Evo is decent. There's no point in buying thermal paste for 7$ for a 30$ cooler, you'd be better of buying a 37$ cooler. If you already own a high-end air cooler and want/need those extra 2°C it does make sense, but 70$+ coolers tend to come with equally good thermal paste.

EDIT:
#107
It's not a "HORRIBLE" idea it just doesn't do anything.

Didn't even read that he recommended arctic SILVER, conductive TIM is really a thing of the past (with the exception of CLU, delidding YEAH).

as5 4 lyfe

I wouldn't really overclock on this budget, with non-overclocking parts, you can step up to a 770, which will tear apart all games at 1080p (while the 760 will struggle with a few). Overclocking on haswell is meh in general, so I would go with not overclocking and a better GPU, which will perform much better in games. The tj08 is a nice case, i've used one, but it has a fatal flaw in that the front fan is 180mm, and only silverstone makes 180mm fans, so you end up having up to use the noisy stock fan, or pay something like 30 dollars for silverstone's better 180mm fan. It's also difficult to route some cables due to it's inverted motherboard design. That being said, if you really want to use the tj08, it still is a decent case.
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-4570 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor ($197.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock B85M Pro4 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($77.55 @ Newegg)
Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($74.99 @ Microcenter)
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($99.92 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($59.98 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 770 2GB Video Card ($334.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Case: Fractal Design Arc Mini R2 MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($99.99 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: XFX ProSeries 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($85.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $1031.38
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-01-06 11:21 EST-0500)

Thanks guys, you've all been helpful. One last question, I'm going to go ahead and pick up an anti-static wristband just to air on the side of caution. Can I hook it to anything that's metal? The table I'll be building on has metal legs, could I hook it to one of the metal struts attached to the legs?

Why would you go 750W on a build that will never be multi gpu??? That motherboard only has one 16x

Woops, it was supposed to be this http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2wDaa

Yes, or just the metal part of your case. My antistatic wristband plugs into a normal wall outlets ground as well.

I had this build all set up and I was ready to buy it, when I remembered to check about firewire compatibility. Turns out this mobo (as far as I can tell) doesn't have it. I need to be able to plug a firewire lead into my pc for my audio card, can somebody please help me rectify this problem whilst still making it a decent gaming/streaming build? <3

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (£167.99 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D14 65.0 CFM CPU Cooler (£57.89 @ Ebuyer)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UD3H ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£131.00 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: Kingston 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£53.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£43.99 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon R9 280X 3GB Video Card (£225.48 @ Dabs)
Case: NZXT NZXT H230 Black ATX Mid Tower ATX Mid Tower Case (£56.68 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: OCZ ZT 650W 80+ Bronze Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply (£70.96 @ CCL Computers)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer (£11.98 @ Ebuyer)
Total: £819.96
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-01-11 20:40 GMT+0000)

EDIT: Could I just swap my mobo for the UD5H version?

EDIT2: Also, do I need to spend this much to have a gaming pc that will be smooth whilst streaming a low/mid quality stream?

Swapping out the motherboard for the UD5H really isn't worth it for the extra expense. What sound card do you have? If it's using firewire and you're looking at a ~£800 budget now, I'm assuming it isn't very modern or was quite cheap, in which case the onboard audio on the motherboard will be more than adequate. Onboard audio on z87 boards is really very good compared to old onboard audio.

As for your streaming question, I have a 3570k and a 7970, so basically the last-gen 4670k and the 280x is just a rebadged 7970 and I could stream 720p 60fps without much noticeable lag and the game was on absolutely max settings, check any VTV cast I streamed. That was using the game at 720p, but with the game at 1080p and a lower quality stream and lower quality graphics you'd be perfectly fine.
I'd recommend possibly going with the GTX770 if you can find it for a similar price however. 280x's are generally very expensive at the moment as they were all bought for the bitcoin mining hype going on and g-sync compatibility will be very useful in the future. AMD has free-sync sure, but it isn't clear whether or not displayport 1.3 (which is required for free-sync from what we know) is included on the 280x.
One other thing I'd recommend changing is getting an SSD, even if it was an SSD with no HD now and then save another £45 at later date for a hard drive. An SSD really does make a difference.

My audio card is necessary for my current music setup, I could change it but it'd cost me more to rearrange than it would just to get the UD5H.

Which are the recommended makes for SSDs?

If you definitely need firewire then sure go for the UD5H. The UD5H is about the best price/performance ratio on z87 boards anyway, but most generally don't need that overclocking performance. Given an NH-D14 however, you can actually make use of it so it isn't wasted money on features you'll never need.

The Samsung 840 Evo is the best price/performance you can get generally. Samsung, Sandisk, Adata and Kingston are all good brands, as they make flash memory so they can save the very best for themselves so they generally get the best performance and reliability. I'd definitely recommend the 840 Evo 128gb or 256gb (or the 840 Pro but it's more expensive) but if you can't find either of those, the Sandisk Extreme and Kingston HyperX are also very good drives.

I would grab a sandisk ultra plus

Just ordered that build with an Ultra Plus, now to break it all as I smash it together.

Low end budget first build, any suggestions? I already have my keyboard, mouse, phones, and monitor (asus 144hz)

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: AMD Athlon X4 750K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($79.98 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: MSI FM2-A85XA-G43 ATX FM2 Motherboard ($71.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: Corsair 4GB (1 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($38.94 @ NCIX US)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($54.99 @ NCIX US)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB Video Card ($160.99 @ Mwave)
Case: Cooler Master HAF 912 ATX Mid Tower Case ($49.99 @ Microcenter)
Power Supply: Cooler Master GX 650W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply ($87.27 @ TigerDirect)
Optical Drive: LG GH24NSB0 DVD/CD Writer ($15.99 @ Microcenter)
Total: $560.14
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-03-08 20:50 EST-0500)