Pc upgrade help....please

Hi all, I'd really appreciate some advice, I'd like to upgrade my pc but I'm not sure what to change to benefit my sl experience, I've listed some of my pc specs (wasn't sure what you'd need) and would like any suggestions you could give me, thank you for your help.

Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Professional
CPU Type AMD Athlon 64, 2000 MHz (10 x 200) 3200+
System Memory 1024 MB (PC3200 DDR SDRAM)
Video Adapter RADEON X800 Series - Secondary (256 MB) Video Adapter RADEON X800 Series (256 MB) 3D Accelerator ATI Radeon X800 XL (R430)
Disk Drive ST360020A (60 GB, 5400 RPM, Ultra-ATA/100)
Disk Drive IC35L120AVV207-1 (120 GB, 7200 RPM, Ultra-ATA/100)
Memory Modules:
DIMM3: Corsair CMX512-3200XL 512 MB PC3200 DDR SDRAM (2.0-2-2-5 @ 200 MHz)
DIMM4: Corsair CMX512-3200XL 512 MB PC3200 DDR SDRAM (2.0-2-2-5 @ 200 MHz)

Without going to the expense of replacing the CPU, which would almost certainly need a new motherboard, memory, HDD's and memory, you could try:

Replace your two 512 sticks of memory with 2x 1GB sticks - that will give you 2GB in total - IMO this will help the most.

Consider chanign your graphics card(s). The XL version of the X800 is the bottom end X800 card.

Make sure you use the IC35L120AVV207-1 as your system HDD as it's the faster of the two.

I would try the memory first and see what difference it makes.

Gomez

"Upgrade" is a wide-open term. Do you mean replace your current system with an entirely new one that's more powerful? Or make incremental changes to your existing system?

If the latter, it depends upon the limits of your motherboard, and perhaps your skill with dealing with components.

With the information you've provided, the obvious incremental changes are to replace the video card, increase the memory, and replace the processor. But there's no way to tell whether any of these are possible without knowing the specs of your motherboard.

When you begin with a system specification that doesn't appear to have any real strengths and try and upgrade so many components, the chances are, you will ultimately spend more money and time doing so, than upgrading the whole system, as 'box shifters' can usually offer better bulk deals.

No doubt, once you buy and install a shiny new graphics card, then the HD will be the bottle neck, followed by the FSB (Mother Board), memory speed, etc etc.

You should look for a strong high end graphics card (not a graphics chip welded to the mother board), suited to a Mother Board (i.e. SLi compliant), minimum of 600 speed memory (2gb minimum), 600+ watt power supply, 2 Sata II HD's (one for OS and Programmes, one for data and caches). A good solid and reliable connection (VIOP takes between 1.5-2mb of your connection). Thats the basic system I would recommend.

I agree with Gomez, but I will say the CPU is probably your weakest link in my opinion.

Take a look at how much life you have left in the system before putting too much money into it now. If you will be upgrading again next year, then the memory you buy today may not fit the future machine. The video card, however, is usually a bit more transportable. I would get the best card my budget would buy with the assumption that any new computer in the offing would be getting this card when the time comes later.

Don't take my word as gospel, tho .... I'm just giving you an option.

Yes, good advice - although the OP does not state if it's AGP or pci-e. If AGP, probably best not to spend any real money on it as newer motherboards wont take it.

Gomez

You might be able to upgrade your CPU if your motherboard supports faster processors. I would add more RAM at minimum. Maybe a new video card if its not an AGP system.

.d

I'm assuming it's a socket 939, original DDR, and AGP video.
Quick and dirty upgrade would be:
1. Replacing the memory with two 1Gb sitcks (not adding to whats there)
2. Buying a faster socket 939 processor (1Mb cache single core, or possibly an original X2 dual core)
3. The fastest AGP video card you can find. (didn't nVidia make a 7xxx series in agp?)
Don't know how much more performance you'd get, but it would be noticible. I'm just not sure if it would justify the cost.

The problem is that almost all the major parts aren't really even made anymore. There's still a few socket 939 Athlon 64s around, but AGP video cards and original DDR memory is getting scarce and costly. The better choice for the future (and future upgrades) would be getting a whole new system.

I would upgrade the ram to the most the board can handle, and then not put another penny into it. Use it until you can't stand it anymore and then buy a new machine.

RAM is the only investment I'd consider making in that system; upgrading to 2GB should be a significant and reasonably inexpensive improvement. But with a caveat... if you can upgrade by ADDING another GB (as either a single 1GB stick or two 512MB sticks) it's worth doing, but if you have to remove your existing memory and buy two 1GB sticks it's likely too expensive. (Annoyingly, DDR memory costs twice as much as DDR2 right now.)

If you want to go any further, it would really be much more cost-effective to build a new system; you could salvage the disk drives and optical drives from the old one if you want (new larger drives would be faster, but that wouldn't improve your Second Life experience much), but you'd pretty much have to replace everything else. You'll need a new motherboard for a current CPU, and that new motherboard won't take your DDR memory or AGP video card; you'll need DDR2 memory and a PCI Express video card. Even reusing all the disk drives might be problematic; new motherboards usually have only one parallel ATA port for disks.

The only other change even worth considering would be a video card. But your system probably has an AGP slot, rather than the newer PCI Express, so your choices are limited and relatively costly. In my opinion, the rest of that system is too far behind the curve to justify the expense of a video card. The memory is a smaller expense, and mostly recoverable by reselling the RAM if you later decide to get a new computer and sell your current one; a new video card would be mostly lost money.

I somewhat agree with this, although with 1GB you might not get anything more in SL by going to 2GB. Try shutting down every other program and utility running except SL, if you see an improvement in SL the memory *might* be worth it.

I do think any upgrade to your configuration is money wasted (perhaps except memory), rather take the money you would use or have budgetted and bank it for a new PC. Also keep in your mind that your old PC may die soon, leaving you with repairs -- again wasting money put into it.

My secondary machine blew up, so I bought an emachines with a 2-core AMD for $409 (from Best Buy), then upgraded the video card. It runs SL buttery smooth (and most games). If you want a full recommendation on a sub $600 game machine, let me know.

I'm kinda assuming that the machine is paging a fair bit between the OS and SL once it has really got going. Combine that with slower drives...

But yes, it might not make much difference.

Hello all,

Thank you so much for all your advice, I had no idea my pc was sooo out of date, lol, after reading through all your replies I think the most sensible idea would be to get a new one instead of spending cash on my old one, I'm sure I've seen threads here on what I should look for and there seem to be some good deals around which would get me a reasonably decent machine without breaking the bank.

Once again, many thanks for your advice, it's greatly appreciated

Orana

Sorry, but that's wrong...
Adding a single 1GB stick to the two 512MB ones she has would drop her out of dual channel mode (128bit memory access) and into single channel mode (64bit memory access)... LOSS of performance. Matched pairs only.

Adding two 512Mb sticks to the ones she has would populate all 4 slots, and when that happens the integrated memory controller inside the Athlon64 CPU reduces the memory speed from 400Mhz (pc3200) to 366Mhz (pc2700), AND it raises the memory cycle time from 1T to 2T... HUGE LOSS of performance.

Dana's right to a point. It would cause a slow down in RAM.

BUT- 4 Gig of RAM running a notch slower than 2 Gig of RAM running faster is still more RAM. Odds are they'd never see a difference unless they're into hardcore hardware performance.

From the OP's System Specs, I'm thinking this is one of the Socket 754 motherboards. My fiancee has the same CPU, is why I'm thinking this.

At that rate, the OP's system might only have 2 slots for RAM to begin with, and AGP video.

For what its worth, I'd look into a new system- Dual Core Processor at least.