This friend is not very demanding but does play many different games (Steam, new titles etc) and doesn't like buying new computers too often.
I'm thinking something along the lines:
- Case - Carbide Air 240. Max cooler height is 120mm.
- Motherboard - Asus H97M-E or H97M-Plus. Maybe GA-H97N-Wifi.
- CPU - Intel Core i3-4370, 3.8 GHz, 54 W. Going quad-core still doesn't seem worth it for casual gaming, or is it?
- RAM - Crucial Ballistix Sport VLP, either 16 GB or just one 8 GB stick for now, depending on the total cost.
- Graphics - MSI GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB Twin Frozr Gaming OC. Not sure if this will last for a while or I'd better step up to a GTX 760?
- Disk - Crucial MX100 256 GB. Can get Evo 840 for almost the same price but I heard that those can be unpredictable...
- CPU cooler - Noctua NH-L12. Thinking it might be a safer bet in the long run than a Big Shuriken 2. A compact tower cooler (80mm fan) with horizontal air flow might fit better with case fans and be much cheaper, but I can't find any such coolers.
- Case fans - Initially just one Noctua 120mm as exhaust or top fan, to replace stock fans. An additional Noctua 140mm if it fits (already got one).
- PSU - Seasonic G360.