|
|||||||
 |
|
|
LinkBack | Thread Tools | Search this Thread | Rate Thread | Display Modes |
12-03-2004, 04:00 PM
|
#1 |
|
Member (7 bit)
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Sacramento, CA
Posts: 105
|
Is it worth the upgrade?
I have an old machine with these specs:
Intel Tabor 3 mobo with P3-850Mhz (a Slot 1 board) 384 MB ram ATI Radeon 7200 64MB card (AGP1X slot) I have a 15-inch LCD display There's not much that I can upgrade, but I could increase RAM and get a newer video card for pretty cheap. If I were to upgrade to 512MB and a Radeon 9200 128MB (about $150 worth of upgrades), would I get halfway decent performance out of some recent games? I'm thinking of Half Life 2, Far Cry, and Pirates. I could upgrade to a 1.0Ghz CPU, but I can get the RAM and the ATI card for less than that cost of the CPU. I'm looking for the cheapest way to play some of those games. Any input or advice? (Besides donate it to a school and start over!) |
|
|
|
12-03-2004, 04:12 PM
|
#2 |
|
Served with Pride
Staff
Premium Member
Join Date: Apr 2003
Location: near the left coast of Michigan
Posts: 14,565
 |
Not to rain on your parade but your last suggestion sounds like the best. Sell it/donate it and start over. Your 1x AGP would severely limit a new Vid card and chances are your memory configuration is 3 slots with a max capacity of 128 per slot. That means 384 is maxed out if I'm right. Only reasonable upgrade I can suggest for that system is a new hard drive with 8Mb cache and Windows 2000 if you're running 98 now.
|
|
|
|
12-03-2004, 04:18 PM
|
#3 |
|
Member (7 bit)
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Sacramento, CA
Posts: 105
|
I hope it's a little less bleak than that...
 The max RAM is 784. I do have 128MB dimms in each of 3 slots right now. I could get 256MB dimms if I wanted. I did upgrade the hard drive some time ago and I do have an HDD with those specs. It's already running WinXP. Have I helped my upgrade case any? 
|
|
|
|
|
12-03-2004, 07:07 PM
|
#4 |
|
Member (10 bit)
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: southern cal
Posts: 644
 |
Personally, I wouldn't even think it's possible to plan thos kind of games with anything under a 1.5 ghz cpu. Someone may know differently, but I think the combo of the slow cpu, the 1x AGP, and the slow RAM would prevent you from any kind of game playing.
But hey! That's just my opinion, and please don't base your descion off of me!! 
|
|
|
|
|
12-03-2004, 09:29 PM
|
#5 |
|
Gremlin Overlord
Join Date: Apr 2003
Location: Australia
Posts: 2,382
|
My suggestion would be to keep the parts you bought recently (the HDD, XP) and build a new machine using them. I think trying to upgrade to play those games will only lead to frustration
|
|
|
|
|
12-03-2004, 09:57 PM
|
#6 |
|
Member (7 bit)
Join Date: Aug 2003
Posts: 100
|
Not to sound cynical but... burn that thing.
You can build a new PC for relatively cheap, 400-500$ that will run HL2 fine. You really can't upgrade your current machine to play HL2. 
|
|
|
|
|
12-03-2004, 10:53 PM
|
#7 |
|
Member (7 bit)
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Sacramento, CA
Posts: 105
|
I appreciate the input, and yes it sounds like I'll be swapping stuff over to a new barebones box.
Hey Moose...This box did great though with Call of Duty and MOH:AA. Ran them both beautifully. I didn't have any gaming problem at all, at least not with the games that I *wanted* to play, until very recently. |
|
|
|
|
12-04-2004, 03:22 PM
|
#8 | |
|
Member (7 bit)
Join Date: Oct 2004
Posts: 71
|
Half Life 2:
Quote:
|
|
|
|
|
|
12-04-2004, 03:28 PM
|
#9 |
|
Member (7 bit)
Join Date: Aug 2003
Posts: 100
|
Just remember, there is a differnce between minimum requirements, and enjoying the game.
|
|
|
|
|
| Bookmarks |
| Thread Tools | Search this Thread |
| Display Modes | Rate This Thread |
|
|
Linear Mode
