computer upgrade question

[weaselnoze]

time to upgrade. currently i have a P3 1ghz with some board i never heard of.  128mb of SD(?)RAM.

im looking for a motherboard/CPU combo in the price range of $100-$200 bucks.  www.tigerdirect.com has some good prices but idk exactly what to get.  i'd prefer a pentium but would settle for the next best (AMD?).  i also want an AGP slot.  i dont care about integrated sound or anything.  in fact that might even be better then my current sound card.   as far as i know all i need is a board/cpu combo and some DDR ram.  i think i can use everything else. 

so i need some input from the computer guys! any reccomendations or suggestions? tips and tricks?  any and all is appreciated

[john]

Is there a Fry's near you?  they have some sweet deals for proc/mobo combos.

[roguegeek]

I think the better way to attack computer upgrades is to figure out what you want to do with it first. What apps do you need to run? Gaming? Something just to waste time on the forums?

[weaselnoze]

well lets see. im really not a gamer anymore. when i need my fix i just play a lil red faction on ps2.  im not into the multimedia movie making or music dloading either.  i dont need something thats super fast however i find that im sitting here staring a lot, waiting for something to load.  the most demanding program i run is prob Photoshop.  i wait A LOT for stuff to load.  i use my computer for research and a lot of photo editing. 

its been so long since i've built a PC so im not up to date with the latest graphics stuff. i think the last time i built a system, AGP was the way to go as opposed to PCI for graphics.  im seeing a lot of boards that dont have AGP slots.  whats up with that?  is there something new that i dont know of?  are most of these boards using integrated graphics? 

[roguegeek]

You don't see AGP on newer boards because PCI-Express (not to be confused with regular PCI)  is the newer standard.

Doesn't look like you're asking for much. You could easily spend $100 and get something very decent. Opposed to buying online from lesser known retailers? The deals are amazing from them. http://www.pricewatch.com/ is a good place to see some nice deals.

[Ed_in_Az]

Weasel, if you're running XP with 128mb of RAM, and waiting for things to load is your only problem with your PC, all you need is RAM. I'm running a PIII 850mhz with 512mb of RAM and nothing slows it down. It's a cheap fix too. Bump yours up to at least 256mb or even 512mb and you should be fine. Here's a good place for cheap RAM online: http://www.geeks.com/

[roguegeek]

Jeez. I didn't even see that. Ed is absolutely right. You still have millage on your system. RAM is cheap and there's no reason why you can't go to 1GB right away. You should see immediate improvement.

[weaselnoze]

wow im surprised to see hear that. this is excellent.  im assuming i have SDRam.. can i just swap that out with DDR? 

[Simba]

no
sd ram and ddr are not compadable dont try an just swap them

you need sd ram you should be able to get is a local computer store

avoide places such as the source, future shop , and best buy they are very over priced

expect to pay about 60 for 256mb and 100 for 512mb

[weaselnoze]

ok.  now i must try and figure out what i have for sure..

but say i find DDR in my system, now will this suffice?  good choice?  cheap at least..

[sys49152]

Step one, download this and post all of your CPU/Motherboard/RAM information.  This is necessary before you buy *anything* for your system, especially RAM that could be completely incompatible :

http://www.cpuid.org/cpuz.php

Also, let's try to understand when you're waiting..

Is it when you try to load an application?  Is it clicking between applications?  Is it the time it takes for Photoshop to do filter/conversion rendering?  Is it all of the above?  If it's load time, you might benefit from a hard drive upgrade as much as a RAM upgrade.

Post the results and it will help us help you out better.  By the way, be careful with Tigerdirect.  The rebate stuff may take forever to reach you.  Their warehouse is very close to where I live, and people often complain that it takes at least 3-4 months and sometimes several before they receive their instant rebates.  You're probably better off ordering from newegg.com, especially since you live south of the border.

[sys49152]

...just ran CPU-Z (it's been a while).  Here's the really useful stuff you need to post :

CPU tab :
- processor name
- processor code name
- processor package
- processor specification

Processor Tab :
- manufacturer
- model
- chipset
- graphics interface version

Memory
- general size

SPD
- the number of slots, and for each slot :
- slot type (right beside the slot #)
- module size
- module bandwidth
- SPD timing tables, frequency


yeah, it's a pain, but it's useful information.  Or you could just get rid of everything an buy one of those really cool new intel duo core Macs. 

[weaselnoze]

this is a cool program thanks and here is the info i pulled

CPU tab :
-Intel P3 EB
- Coppermine-T
- Socket 370 FC-PGA
- Intel P3 EB 1000MHz

Processor Tab :
- unknown
- unknown
- VIA Apollo Pro Rev. 44
- AGP v2.0
Memory
- 128mb SDRAM

SPD
- the number of slots:1
- SDRAM- module size
- module size 128 Mb
- SPD timing tables, frequency -100MHz

[sys49152]

Excellent.  That helps.  And because I'm lazy..

Is it when you try to load an application?  Is it clicking between applications?  Is it the time it takes for Photoshop to do filter/conversion rendering?  Is it all of the above?  If it's load time, you might benefit from a hard drive upgrade as much as a RAM upgrade.

It'll help figuring out what you really need..

[weaselnoze]

loading apps isnt usually bad.  its the filters and saving of files (large ones) that is slow.  i cant have that many apps open at once or things start to slow considerably and i run into programs that dont respond.  its been 6 months or so since i've reformatted last, im gonna do that too.

[Ed_in_Az]

From that programs output it looks like you've only got one RAM slot, and it's 100mhz stuff you need. It's uncommon to only have a single slot. Do stear clear from tigerdirect. It took 3 months for my rebate there. Again, one of my favorites is computergeeks. Here's the page for your SDRAM,  http://www.geeks.com/products_sc.asp?cat=719 . They've got a 512mb DIMM for $49.95(512MB SDRAM PC100 ECC Registered 168-Pin DIMM ). This is assuming your system will accept 512mb of RAM. Still don't know what size hard drive you have. Check the size and free space.

[sys49152]

Here's the best option I could find given the budget ( < $200 USD) :

From NewEgg :

CPU :
- AMD Sempron 64 2600 (retail, which includes heatsink and fan) $71

Motherboard :
- ECS 755-A2 v1.0 (Socket 754, AGP and ATA Drive support) $43.99

Memory :
- BUFFALO 1GB 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) $68.83

Total (not including shipping) : $183.82

Here's why I picked the above components :

- the chip could be upgraded in a year or two with an Athlon 64 bit processor (Socket 754) which would provide significant performance improvement, especially if you find that photoshop operations run a bit slow with each successive version of the software.  And I'm sure those chips, in a year or two, could be had for very very cheap off ebay.

- the price is right.  It's probably going to be close to $200, which I set as the upper limit.  And it will be a stunningly fast compared to your existing system.. not application load times (hard drive dependent) but definitely processing times for photoshop rendering and switching between applications (browser, photoshop, email client app, whatever).

- the RAM could be used in any resonably recent system.. so that's not a throw-away regardless of your next upgrade path.  The caveat being that the upgrade happens again in the next year or two.

You could of course modify/substitue different manufacturers, but just keep in mind that if you go with the AMD processor (Socket 754), you need :

- a socket 754 motherboard, and one that supports 64 bit processors
- a motherboard that supports ATA drives (not *just* serial ATA)
- a motherboard that has AGP support (this is getting harder and harder)
- RAM that operates at 400Mhz (PC3200).  And since you've got 1 GB (in the configuration I listed above) in a single chip, you could always get another 1GB if you go out and buy a Canon 5D or something crazy like that, and need to process a few hundred megs of raw iimag data in RAM. 

[yamahonkawazuki]

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1643731&sku=MBM-U8668-340
ive never had probs with tigerdirect or the rebates. now in addition to this youd need a vid card, can get a cheap one at wally world or frys or any places that sells these things, and memory, but this would be a decent starting point. im tryin to stay away from the socket 754 boards. seems like fewer and fewer cpus are being made for them. see more and more socket 939 stuff and pcie vid cards too. i had just finished my build using an nforce4 ultra mobo and an amd opteron144 processor on this build. and its a screamer. but if youre not into blazing speeds etc. what i posted would work for you

[groff22]

I've had good luck with a company called NCIX, www.ncix.com. Your CPU seems ok, you definatly need more RAM and like someone else said 512mb should be enough for what you do.

[RVertigo]

www.pricewatch.com