What should I upgrade?

[jimmy_fowler]

Hi guys,

I guess I'm somewhat of a newbie here. I've been a computer user for donkeys years, and I'm well versed enough to fiddle with some success, but in terms of hardware I know little. I recently got a new computer, and have some spare money to upgrade a few bits.

These are the main problems:

- I have a large screen, so games and especially DVDs come out a tad pixelated even on highest resolution and sharpness, etc.
- It's often a little bit stop-starty in PC games.
- It's a good computer, but I'm sure it could be better!


Anyways these are the specs: (btw if I get this wrong, I apologise, I'm reading it off of Device Manager hehe).

- Fujitsu Siemens Scaleo P
- Radeon X550 Graphics Card
- NEC ND-4551 DVD-RW drive
- M-Audio Firewire Solo recording interface/sound card
- Samsung SyncMaster 913N Monitor
- Intel Pentium 4 3.6 GHz Processor


Is there anything there that's a glaring problem that could be upgraded? Many thanks for your help.

 

[joelbeveridge]

Thats a rather nice PC. I really like the CPU. For all you people that want total information about your computer, go and download Belarc Advisor- http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html This is a free easy to use software that gives you a total report of your COMPUTER, and i mean total, every little bit.

Is your screen a flat screen or a CRT? go download and run that software if you want a better understanding of whats in your PC without opening it up.

 

[jimmy_fowler]

Thanks man, I'll do that. Sorry to have taken your time with a newbie question. Glad you like my PC And thanks for your help

It's a flat screen btw.

 

[jimmy_fowler]

Ok Belarc told me this:

Processor:

3.60 gigahertz Intel Pentium 4
16 kilobyte primary memory cache
2048 kilobyte secondary memory cache


Main Circuit Board:

Board: FUJITSU SIEMENS P5SD1-FM2 Rev 1.xx
Bus Clock: 200 megahertz
BIOS: American Megatrends Inc. 0304 01/03/2006


Memory Modules:

1024 Megabytes Installed Memory
Slot 'DIMM0' has 512 MB (serial number SerNum0)
Slot 'DIMM1' has 512 MB


Display:

RADEON X550 [Display adapter]
RADEON X550 Secondary [Display adapter]
Samsung SyncMaster [Monitor] (19.1"vis, s/n H9NYC39205, December 2005)


Bus Adapters:

SiS 7001 PCI to USB Open Host Controller (3x)
SiS PCI to USB Enhanced Host Controller

 

[The Amish Kid]

The only thing that I can think of is upgrading your video card. I tried googling it but couldn't come up with much information on what type of graphics slot it uses. My recomendation is a Geforce 7600gt. Right now that is the best as far as price/performance goes.

One more thing that might be nice is going to 2gb of memory, but that isnt as important.

 

[joelbeveridge]

Well it seems like you really want it for gaming, and we all know games love Memory and a good Vidoe card. Now i didnt get how much memory your Video card has?? 128MB? 256MB? More? you dont need a new CPU becuase that one is really good. But one thing about computer is that they love Memory, give them more and they will eat it up. So in the end memory up to 2 GB would rule and a Really good video card with 256mb or higher would rock gaming. OH if you have SATA ports for your hard drive and your using IDE, SATA would be good to jump over to.

 

[jimmy_fowler]

Cool cool, thanks a lot.

Yes I mean any old computer can handle work, essays, spreadsheets etc, so the main thing I use it for is gaming.

It will however, when I go to university, become my DVD player as well, so it will see a lot of use playing DVDs.

Thanks for the help thus far guys.

 

[jimmy_fowler]

I think the Video Card memory is 128mb.

 

[The Amish Kid]

Memory isn't everything on video cards. The type of memory, clock speeds, etc also affect performance. Video card memory is important but it isnt everything.

 

[jimmy_fowler]

Oh no, I tell a lie, it's 256mb.