need help with what video card and memory

[2burn_t]

I now have a Compaq Presario 5100NX, 2.6 GHz, 256 MB.

i plan to build a BETTER unit in the not too distant future.. and will canabolize this one for some of the hardware, so what i inprove this one with will end up in the new one.

I laln to add Memory, this one only has 2 slots, i have 256MB, should/can i put in a 512MB i saw that was not too much more than the 256MB,

I saw a Radeons and Gforce video cards discounted about in the price range i can afford now.. an ATI Radeon 256 DDR 9600pro...or Ge Force 6600 128MB.

i really dont know much about this stuff... i dont really play the complex games .. i just play in a league in an older game... i dont know what MB i need [128/256] for the better computer/ or if it can even handle too much higher demand even if i put 512 in it ..this computer only has the white sockets...i dont know the term for them yet. My old Hp has a TNT2 VANTA ASUS [3 spade slots/brown]...i'm dating myself here.

I am not into serious competition but i have such bad latency in a 7 year old game that i get shot down by pople that arent even pointed my direction.. It freezes for 10 seconds and jerks around so much i cant play at all...

thanks for any help

[Alaron]

Your system can indeed take some more ram. Crucial makes excellent quality ram and they garuntee that This DDR RAM will be compatible with your system. It is a bit pricy but pc2100 is older and less popular so its expensive. Add the largest 1 stick you can afford. Extra ram will do wonders to speed up a system.

Graphics wise, if you only have white slots, you'll need a PCI video card. PCI slots are the white ones and they aren't used often for video cards but in this case we have no choice. Any video card that is "AGP" will not work for you since that is a different slot which you do not have.

This card is only $68 and will perform well for you until you upgrade. Check out the Geforce FX5200 PCI Video Card

Hope this helps.