Thought I had $2k for a build, only have like $1500

Hey all, second post here. I have posted about getting help on my build when I had $2000 to spend on it, but unfortunately only had $1500. Also, should I even begin to consider AMD or just stay away at this point in time? I will post the build below and any advice helps! Thank you all!

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/RXg9yc

The way I see it you could just get a 4690k and a single 980. I'm more of a single GPU guy, but this is just the way I'd do it. 

Pinching a couple more pennies:

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/svr4Jx

Would either of y'all consider getting an amd cpu or card??

Not a CPU, but you could consider two R9 290s or 290x's which will be give you a lot better performance than a 980.

I'm assuming this is for gaming with two 970's? if its pure gaming you can probably put a triscuit in the cpu socket (socket 11-tasty) and be fine. If you don't want to overclock, a non-k part and a shittier cooler might help. Also, it'll be black friday/cybermonday soon....

And sli 970s look like a sweet spot from what internet.com is saying so I'd stick with that for bitchin framerates, theres no shame in AMD however.

Best of luck!

I agree two r9 290s or 290x's are a great choice i own 1 sapphire r9 290 tri-x and they are powerful indeed and great at overclocking and stay around 75 degrees and will never go over 80 degrees with the fan speed at 50-40%. And if you have little more cash a Vapor-x is even better and being cooler about 2-5 degrees less.

Would xfire 290x's be safe for a 650 watt psu? 

I'd obviously like to keep the the two 970s, but how is the AMD fx 8350 compared to a i5-4690k for example?

No way forget that you will need watts about 850-1000 is somewhere there i think not 100% sure but somewhere around that.

Aren't the AMD GPUs still pretty overpriced though or am I wrong on that?

850 for a crossfire 290/290x setup is probably the sweet spot 

R9 290's are at the $250's and R9 290x's are at $300+. So they're kind of super low...

The 970s I am seeing are cheaper than the 290xs....