$4-500 to spend...

[talldude123]

By my birthday, i will have $300 saved up, and i will probably get $200 total from relatives/parents for bday money.

My question it...
What could i get for my PC to make it last longer?

1. I could max out the RAM for $150, but is that a large upgrade from 512mb to 2GB?

or..

2. Buy a video card that would actually play decent games...

or..

3. Buy a CRT/LCD monitor, around 17".

Any suggestions?
My PC is in my sig.

 

[Merkwürdigeliebe]

what kind of video card you have now? and do you know what kind of video card slot is available to you?

 

[zmatt]

if your cpu is socket 478 then spend $200 to go pentium4, then another $50 to buy a 1gig stick, and $180 for a radeon X700 or Geforce 6600. hope that helps

 

[Brtnboarder495]

This is what I'd do:

DFI Nforce 4 Ultra-D $125
Athlon 64 3000+ $140
Antec Truepower 2.0 $90
XFX 6800XT $135
Corsair Value Select 2x512mb $70

That'll come in just below $600, but it'll be great because you can transition to a solid, entry-level AMD gaming computer.

It'll make it easier to upgrade to a faster processor, memory and video card in the future because you have all the complaint expansion slots, and the power supply for to do it.

Then for your *next* upgrade, shoot for a solid Samsung or LG 17" $200 LCD if you want it badly then too. Then you can pretty much upgrade other things in whatever order you want.

 

[aliasaid]

brtn has a good idea.

but i'd get a mobo thats $50 cheaper or so, like the msi k8neo4.. no need for the dfi when you're on such a budget. also, i'd get the FSP 450watt power suply for $51. that should bring you down to $500

 

[talldude123]

This is what I'd do:

DFI Nforce 4 Ultra-D $125
Athlon 64 3000+ $140
Antec Truepower 2.0 $90
XFX 6800XT $135
Corsair Value Select 2x512mb $70

I dont need a super-high performance video card, i just wanna play a few games from about 2003-2004 area (racing and RPGs). My ASRock motherboard will not support AMD, it says in the manual, it supports 2.8Ghz Pentium 4 at the most. I need my RAM maxed out, as my computer seems to slow down alot, and RAM is cheap.

Would my system be much faster if i bought a Celeron 2.93 ghz processor, or just keep using my 2.66 Ghz?

 

[talldude123]

what kind of video card you have now? and do you know what kind of video card slot is available to you?

I have an Intel 82845GL 64MB chipset. Its built into the motherboard, and its crappy.

 

[talldude123]

Also, what are your opinions on HP monitors?

New ones are sold for $80 each, refurbished, and seem like good monitors. Are there flaws with HP monitors?

 

[aliasaid]

we know your mobo doesn't support AMD, thats why he suggested a whole new motherboard.

you won't see much performance boost from celeron 2.66 to 2.9.. total waste of money there.

if you have $500, you should really get a whole new system.

look at the modifications i made to brtnboarder's parts.. i believe i brought it down to $500 without compromising performance.

if you really really want, you can get a crappier vid card and go for 2gb of ram, or even get integrated video... but even if you do moderate gaming, the former build is excellent. 1gb of ram seems sufficient to me...

 

[talldude123]

wouldnt 2GB of RAM make up for my crappy video chipset? or would i need to get both?

as you can see by my sig, i am never staying away from celeron, ive used them since they were invented.