Neek

Intel Penitum 4 2.66ghz
1280MB PC2100 - DDR RAM
Not sure what motherboard I have
ALL-IN-WONDER Radeon 9700
120GB Hard drive (20GB free space)

I want to be able to get a better framerate in pretty much all my games. I put the hard drive there because I thought maybe that could be slowing me down some and if its worth it to get another like 80GB or so. I'm just wondering what I should upgrade in order of importance. Thanks.

synapseguru

If I were you I would upgrade your processor....Try one of the new P4 3.0 Ghtz HTT processors. After that look into getting more ram.

Sarkast

Adding harddrives doesnt make your PC any faster - it'll just give you more storage space. The only way to improve performance is to switch to a faster harddrive (for example if yours is 5400rpm you go to 7200 or 10K).

The biggest impact on gaming performance comes from your graphics card. I see guys with a sub 1Ghz Pentium playing the latest games aslong as they have a 6800GT etc.

So in order to really improve you would've to switch the graphics card - which would have a much bigger impact on framerates than going to a 300Mhz faster CPU (even if its HT). Besides - without knowing what board you have theres a chance it doesnt even support HT.

Adding more memory wont help anymore - you are already past one GB.
Depending on if your current motherboard supports faster memory - you could still have a big performance jump by switching to DDR400 i.e. If your board doesnt support that maybe you should look into upgrading that first - then get some Dual Channel DDR400.

crazijoe

What you have listed for memory doesn't sound right. I have never heard of a combination that will give you 1280MB of memory. I going to have to assume that you have 128MB memory. I would first get more memory. At least 512MB. Also I would get PC2700 or DDR333. This would be the proper memory speed for the 533MHz FSB of the processor. With your present setup, you are downgrading the memory bus speed to 266MHz when, with the 533MHz FSB processor, you can run up to a 333MHz memory bus speed.

Neek

Nah I'm positive I have 1280MB RAM. 512+512+256.

And then for upgrading my RAM to something faster, the people that we bought the computer from said that PC2100 DDR was the fastsest it could handle.

So looks like I should upgrade my motherboard+processor eh? Since wouldn't I have to spend like $400+ on a video card to see good improvement?

Looked around Newegg a bit and realized that I don't really know what to look for in a motherboard. But I did find this for a processor. Then I also found this for RAM upgrade which will probably be a while after I get the motherboard+processor. So what motherboard would you guys recommend?

Thanks again for all the help so far.

crazijoe

I would question the credibility of the people that you have bought your computer from then. Since every MB I have purchased that supports 533MHz FSB works best with PC2700 memory when you operate it at that speed.

dai

when you start upgrading always look at the power supply first to make sure it is capable of handling the upgrades

MD_Willington

You've answered it in your question...You want better frame rates get a new videocard, if your budget allows get a 9800 Pro or 9800 XT.

With that you may need to get a stronger power supply since they use quite a few amps on the 12V line.

MD

Neek

Hmm alright, thanks for the advice guys. I guess it will be a while since I upgrade since graphics cards are rather expensive heh. And I feel like I want to make a bigger leap than a 9700 to a 9800 so I guess the upgrade shall be delayed.

johnwill

I think it's time to consider a whole new system. None of the possible upgrades are alone going to make a significant difference. you have plenty of memory, your processor is a reasonable speed, and I suspect you probably have a 7200 RPM hard disk.

The next jump in performance is something like a P4 3.2ghz 800FSB, dual DDR memory, RAID-0 disks, PC3200 memory, and a video card upgrade. All of this would probably dictate a new MB...