Upgrading a eMachines

[Dustin_Broke]

Well I' am in a very limited budget right now so I need to save a little by little to upgrade the tower. Now I also found out that my power supply is a Micro ATX type and it's 150 watts. Here is a pic of what it says on the power supply.

Heres a pic of the actualy power supply.

Now someone said that the power supply is important but do you think I can add a PCI card like the GeForce 2 series or ATI Radeon 7200 or better on this machine? I can get some used parts from Ebay. Of cource if my PC will work for a ATI Radeon 9250 or GeForce FX series that would even be better.





But I' am still shocked that any PCI cards would be better than the AGP2X I have onboard. But will it forsure even the GeForce 2 Series be better than the onboard chip I have??

 

[DoubleHelix]

The RAM upgrade alone will probably run at least $50 if you can even find new, reliable RAM for it. It's so old, it's not widely available. I don't get the affinity for ancient technology. Any money spent on that system is money wasted. None of the upgrades can be used on a new computer. You can buy a brand new Dell desktop for less than $300 that would be hundreds of times more powerful.

 

[Dustin_Broke]

Well yes for to max the ram to 512mb it will be close to $50. I can get an OEM ram for $25 each stick that has 256mb. About the money to get at least $300 is not going to work since that will take a long time. I can only upgrade the current PC to it's best since I can buy little by little the parts for it. Also as I said I want to keep this since this was a gift and I liked it alot. I remember my dad paid around $450 and he could of got me the T1090 instead but he wanted me to have something that was at least 1 ghz speed since all my other older PCs back then were like 700mhz or less. Basicaly this was my first PC that had Windows XP and he did get it right when Windows XP came out. The T1090 was like mine but had a 900mhz processor and it also had Windows XP on it but it was cheaper like around $400 or maybe less. I think my dad might of gotten a good deal for my T1100 machine for $400 since his good at finding good deals. So probley the T1090 machine you could of gotten it for less then $400. At least he was nice to get me something that was 1 ghz instead of 900mhz like the T1090.

But if I can add a video card and more ram probley that would make a huge difference.

 

[blasterfreak88]

I believe that you should just buy a cheap new computer or maybe one that is a couple of years old on cragslist or something. I had an emachine that was only like 4 years old and it was going to be so unreasonable to upgrade it and it even had a PCIE slot. Old tech is just a money pit where you get nothing our of it. This is why I chucked that old emachine to the back of the closet and just dropped 1600 on a new gaming rig and it was an excellent choice. I suggest saving up and getting something new even if you have to wait a couple of months for the money.

 

[95BlackGA]

Well I' am in a very limited budget right now so I need to save a little by little to upgrade the tower. Now I also found out that my power supply is a Micro ATX type and it's 150 watts. Here is a pic of what it says on the power supply.

Heres a pic of the actualy power supply.

Now someone said that the power supply is important but do you think I can add a PCI card like the GeForce 2 series or ATI Radeon 7200 or better on this machine? I can get some used parts from Ebay. Of cource if my PC will work for a ATI Radeon 9250 or GeForce FX series that would even be better.





But I' am still shocked that any PCI cards would be better than the AGP2X I have onboard. But will it forsure even the GeForce 2 Series be better than the onboard chip I have??

You can add any PCI based GPU to that system, but the thing is, power. You'll also be bottle necked by the CPU. Not all PCI cards will be faster, but most will, I believe. That little power supply will have to be upgraded. What are the general uses of the computer? What are your intentions for this upgrade?

 

[Apokalipse]

the power supply can power up to 4A on the +12V Rail, which is 48W
Options will be extremely limited.

 

[Dustin_Broke]

If it's only 48 watts why does it say 150 watts max power?


I use my computer to play older games like UT 2004, The Sims, Quake 3 Arena etc. Also I browse the internet and watch Youtube and listen to my music using Windows Media Player. I also use iTunes to sync music to my iPod. I usualy install the older version of iTunes since the newer ones need a better machine. Most softwares I installed are older since the newer ones need a better machine.


But would you say the GeForce 2 series or ATI Radeon 7000 series is better than the AGP2X card I have? Since I remember you guys said some PCI cards are better than my AGP2X onboard card but I was wondering if you were talking about the higher end ones like GeForce FX series or better.

Maybe the GeForce 2 series or so is not as good as my onboard AGP graphic chip I don't know.

 

[Apokalipse]

48 watts is how much it can supply at +12V
Most of the power the video card gets is from the +12V rail

 

[Dustin_Broke]

Well you guys did say that some PCI video cards would be better than mine but what card will that be? Also will it work somehow on the power supply I have? If not I do see a power supply for around $20 that is a 200 watt on Ebay but will that at least somehow work?

 

[Slaymate]

If you truely value this PC then you should leave it as close to it's original specifications as possible. Collectors items are always more valuable when there all original equipment. And you should only power it up once or twice a month and keep it clean. Most of the parts from back then were rated for about 10 years of use with optimal conditions. Your in an uphill battle that's costing more than the replacement parts are worth.