[sgl1]

After 3 years my machine needs an overhaul. So I'm asking you brilliant people for suggestions. I really don't play many games. I mostly just multi-task. I do have a copy of Oblivion I can't play though. My machine has gone through some issues in the 3 years so it needs to be refreshed with new memory, video, mb and brains. But I really need to do this for under $500. I'd like to throw in a decent Light Scribe deck as well.

This site here http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...2100160,00.asp, has a setup for around $800 but thats a bit steep. I currently run an AMD Athlon with a gig of memory on a Gigabyte board and I've thought about just throwing some additional memory and a new video card on but it'll only run agp cards. I kinda want a new "Steve Austin" rig. (better, stronger,faster)

The site above recommends Intel at $185 a pop but I have been happy with my AMD chip and they are cheaper. Don't need a sound card and have a new WD 250G sata drive. What do you suggest? Thanks in advance.

[Micro Soft Lad]

Hello,

Oblivion is a very demanding game to run properly. I'm no expert on upgrades but adding another 1GB of memory and getting a better graphics card is probably the cheapest way to go. Just make sure that you're system can handle 2GB of RAM and get compatible stuff to what you've already got. You can get a 512MB AGP graphics card for about £50-60 here in the UK, so I'd imagine that's about $100 in the good ol US of A. I think it's a big install too so make sure you've the hard drive space for it.

Cheers

[sgl1]

Originally Posted by Micro Soft Lad

Hello,

Oblivion is a very demanding game to run properly. I'm no expert on upgrades but adding another 1GB of memory and getting a better graphics card is probably the cheapest way to go. Just make sure that you're system can handle 2GB of RAM and get compatible stuff to what you've already got. You can get a 512MB AGP graphics card for about £50-60 here in the UK, so I'd imagine that's about $100 in the good ol US of A. I think it's a big install too so make sure you've the hard drive space for it.

Cheers

I think what I'm going to do is learn how to update my bios firstly, because it needs it. Then maybe try to overclock my machine. But you're right about ram and card, those are two things I may do. But I think a 512 card is more than that. problem is I hate to spend even $100 on an agp vid card when pci-express is the way to go now.

[Micro Soft Lad]

Hello,

You're right about PCI Express being the future but do you really need to do it if you don't play many games? There are a lot of alternatives to Oblivion out there, Morrowind etc. will be less demanding of your current system.

Be careful if updating your BIOS, make sure you get the correct one and always back up your old BIOS first. Most motherboards come with a utility to do this. Updating the BIOS doesn't make too much difference to a machines speed, they usually just add support for more modern hardware.

Cheers

[sgl1]

Originally Posted by Micro Soft Lad

Hello,

You're right about PCI Express being the future but do you really need to do it if you don't play many games? There are a lot of alternatives to Oblivion out there, Morrowind etc. will be less demanding of your current system.

Be careful if updating your BIOS, make sure you get the correct one and always back up your old BIOS first. Most motherboards come with a utility to do this. Updating the BIOS doesn't make too much difference to a machines speed, they usually just add support for more modern hardware.

Cheers

Yeah I have Morrowind. It's ok. I'm looking into updating the video card bios as well. But yeah, I will be very careful with the mb bios. Already screwed up trying it once before.

[absolutezero1287]

Hmmm...about upgrading the RAM. Supposedly my Dell Dimension 2400 isn't supposed to hold 2GB of RAM. But I went and installed it anyway. It was immediately recognized. Interesting what Dell's site says and what the computer can actually do, huh?