Need some help on My memory, and Vid Card

[Chrisman88990]

Hey, Just bought sims2. The system requirments say like 800 Mhz processer, 256 MB of ram, and at least a 32 MB T&L capable video card. my computer is a Gateway, with an AMD athlon 950Mhz, with Performance Enhancing Cache Memory. 192MB Memory. With only a 16MB Nvidia TNT-2 video card, with a vanta graphics accelerator. And 20 GB hardrive. My question is, is there anyway that game will even run on my computer ? And how do i know what kind of memory to buy, like how many pin does it have to be and stuff. And will any video card go into it ?

 

[Nubius]

I doubt you'll be able to play it. Those requirements thay have are the absolute minimum requirements and even that isn't set in stone. They are talking absolute lowest settings and even then it'll be somewhat iffy...especially with the lack of RAM and a completely crappy graphics card your CPU won't be able to make up for that.

I'm pretty sure being how old your computer is, that it takes SDRAM like PC100 or PC133 but you'd have to check your mobo's manufacturer website to make sure.

You could download a program like CPU-Z just google that name and you'll find it. That program will tell you what kind of RAM you currently have in your machine and will atleast give you an idea if you can run SDRAM or DDR so you could get PC2100 if it took DDR.

To find out the complete list of compatibilities of course you'd need the website like I said.

Any video card should be able to replace your current assuming it's AGP.

Even if it is AGP though more than likely your board is only AGP 4x whereas todays cards are 8x..and even though your board is 4x that card might be so old it's only 2x.

Again CPU-Z will give you all the information you need. CPU info, motherboard info, RAM info, AGP Info

 

[Chrisman88990]

THanks for the quick reply

Hey, thanks for the info. Yeah ill download that and see what i got, i got the computer in 2000. But in 4 years, well almost 5 now, alot has changed i guesse. Do you think it would be possible to get upgrades to play sims 2 ? or is it too old to even get upgrades to play the game. Like, should i just return the game, or is there anyway i can get stuff to play it ?

 

[Nubius]

You should probably return the game =/

Your computer is pretty outdated man. Computers go obsolete within a year and a half lol.

But yeah you'd need to upgrade the motherboard first. That way you could ensure that you had AGP 8x which currently even AGP is starting to give way to PCI-Express but that won't be for a few more months until that's fully integrated.

You'll want a mobo that can support 400FSB CPU's and RAM.

You'd want motherboard, cpu, RAM, Graphics card in that order to get your computer up to snuff really.

Like I said chances are you can only support up to PC133 which is REALLY slow by todays standards. Even PC2100 is considered ancient. PC133 = 133MHz, PC2100 = 266MHz, PC2700 = 333MHz, PC3200 = 400MHz and although it's not really standard and fairly new they got PC4000 = 500MHz and they still keep going up but PC4000 and up really isn't common right now. PC3200 is basically the top for now until the higher RAMs get faster timings to them

So you can see how the PC133 would not even come close to stacking up against PC3200.

Get a new mobo that support DDR400(PC3200) and a FSB of 400 and you'll have quite the considerable upgrade. Not only that also like I said your AGP slot I'm pretty sure isn't 8x at all....

so there's another good upgrade that wuld be occuring.

EDIT: Mind you you could just stick in the game and see how it plays and make your own decision, but I know it won't play well even on all lowest settings probably and as for any other future games yeah, no chance

 

[Chrisman88990]

:/

wah that sucks man, yeah i downloaded that program, and its only 4x, and my memory is only 133mhz. hmm well looks like im gunna have to return the game. My stepdad has a dell in the house, in his office. It is maybe 2 years old. Ill have to get on that and see the specs and see if it will run on that. thanks for the information.

 

[Nubius]

you're welcome and good luck

Sorry that it wasn't quite what you had hoped for =/

Trust me I've made tons of purchases and realized I bought the wrong thing for my needs

 

[Chrisman88990]

yeah man, it realy sucks i wanted to play that game.. maybe if i bought like 256mb more of SDRAM at 133mhz, and got a good 4x video card, maybe it would play the game, what do you think ?

 

[quartz01]

^^^ yea it would. you can get 256mb of ram that fits your needs for like $35-$40 on ebay and try to get 9600 (non-pro or XT) for you new video card. remember, a 4X motherboard can take 8x cards but will run them at 4x speeds

 

[Chrisman88990]

cool, well if i got those two things put them in, and the game would start up and run. Would it be playable ? or would it lag so much i couldent play it ?? and whats the difference between 8x and 4x, like if i got that card your talking about, what would the fact that it can only run at 4x, have on the performance of the card ?

 

[Chrisman88990]

any ideas..