What should I upgrade?

[kodmaster]

In my signature is my computer that I built a month or two ago and I would like to upgrade somthing for my birthday that is coming up. I want to be able to run BF2 (if possible). What do you suggest? I apoligize if I put this in the wrong forum.

Thanks,
Kody

[ktkendall]

I would go with another 512 Meg Ram, and up the monitor to a bigger size screen..

[kodmaster]

I'm pretty fine with the monitor(I have an old CRT lying around if I felt like adding more screen space but my screen looks fine to me) but I'm wondering if my video card will support BF2? will it?

[Alaron]

Battlefield 2 is a resource hog. Your best upgrade for that would be to have at least 1GB of ram. Also, if you're a gamer, upgrading to a newer video card, like a 6800 series or higher would have a huge impact.

Do you have a budget?

[kodmaster]

how much is the 6800? I'm pretty sure I'll go with the 512mb ram upgrade. I got my current ram for only like $43 Canadian or about 35 US. It's pretty decent to.

[Alaron]

Cheapest 6800GT I found was $280CA. http://search.ncix.com/displayproductdetail.php?sku=111106034&vpn=EN6800GT/2DT/256&manufacture=ASUS%20COMPUTER%20INTERNATIONA
So it would be a big purchase, but if you are a big gamer, it would be a huge change from the 6200.

The ram is the definite upgrade though. Adding more will not only speed up games, but the whole system.

:)

[kodmaster]

I don't have that much money at the moment so I don't think I'll be getting that. I would like to know from someone though wether bf2 will work onmy current video card. Thanks Alaron though. For your future reference I have found www.pccanada.com to have the cheapest Canadian parts (although they don't have much selectio and it's hard to navigate) they are reputable to. Actually it's where I bought almost all my parts. They have the 6800 for 240 instead of 280
http://www.pccanada.com/viewitem.asp?id=4126

edit: The ram will definetely help because I always have tons of things clogging up my taskbar

[mmendoza27]

Does your 6200 have Turbocache, if so it would really suck when it comes to BF2. That game is a heavy for graphic cards (besides Quake 4 and F.E.A.R.) so I would really recommend something greater than a 6800 GT. By the way, do you have PCI-Express slots? That would really help, better than just AGP 8x or 4x.

Newegg.com has a Asus (good brand) 6800GT 256MB GDDR3 card for $229, they usually have the best deals.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814121192

As well, with the upgrade to GPU, an extra 512MB RAM would not hurt at all, I've heard from benchmarks that BF2 needs about 1.5-2GB RAM, just depends what resolution and all that stuff.

[glc]

mmendoza, Newegg does not ship to Canada.

[jfk]

I'd look at a 6800GS which can be found for a little less than $200 and another 512Kb of Ram. If you can't afford both, I'd find the money for the video card and then add the other half gig of ram as soon as you could afford to. JMO.

[glc]

I think in this case the ram is more important - BF2 lists 512mb as bare minimum and many users are reporting 2gb is needed for doing it right. The 6200 vs. BF2 has been addressed in another thread - this is not kodmaster's only thread on this issue. The 6200 is not on the supported list for the game, but it *is* a DX9 card - and cards as low as a Radeon 9500 are supported. Yes, you need to do 2 upgrades, no doubt, but if you can't afford a 6800 class card right now, get the ram. It would not be worth upgrading the video card to any less than that. By the time you save enough to get a card, you may be able to afford a 7800, which would be even better. Toss another 512 in now.

[piasabird]

Best bet might be a matched pair of 512 or 1 Gig Ram Modules. These newer motherboards tend to run better with Fewer Pieces of Ram (SDRAM DIMMS).

I have not run a SIS chipset in a while so it is hard to say what it likes.

[glc]

That board does support dual channel ram, so just get an exact match to the existing module.

[Marke522]

I totally agree with glc, while the video card will make a huge improvement, but only on the games performance, the additional ram will make the entire computer run better.

Get the memory, and be sure to match the memory you're allready using.