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Want a second opinion

FerusaFerusa Member Posts: 211
in Hardware

Hello, I am looking to upgrade my computer in the near future. I have about 400 dollars + maybe 100 extra from christmas/my birthday which is this month.

I have a Dell Dimension 8400.

Processor: Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.40GHz (2 CPUs

Memory: 1022MB RAM

And what I guess to be my video card...

        Card name: RADEON X300 Series

     Manufacturer: ATI Technologies Inc.

        Chip type: RADEON X300 SE (0x5B60)

         DAC type: Internal DAC(400MHz)

When I first got my computer, I had virtually no lag issues, now I have delay often, and with games like Age Of Conan/Warhammer Online coming out, I don't think my computer could handle them.

Also, while I am not so sure this has to do with my computers lag, when I first got my computer, it was all I had connected to the internet, now we run another computer, a labtop, and an xbox 360 (for xbox live) off of my router, they said it doesn't effect speed at all, but it just seems suspicious to me, any help there would be appreciated.

Though we have heard of stupid haste in war, cleverness has never been seen associated with long delays.
-Sun Tzu, the Art of War

Comments

  • CleffyIICleffyII Member, Newbie CommonPosts: 3,440

    Hard to say how to upgrade if we don't know what your Motherboard is.  Your Motherboard is probably too old or incompatible with rescent parts considering that its a Dell.

    image

  • Agent_X7Agent_X7 Staff WriterMember, Newbie CommonPosts: 515

    The 8400 is fairly old, bt it does use 533 DDR2 RAM and has a PCI-E slot for the graphics card.

    You could start by upgrading to 2 GB of RAM (may have to check with Dell for compatibility) and getting a more recent PCI-E video card. Your system is never going to compete with a newer one, but upgrading the RAM and video card should stave off obsolescence for a while longer.

    Agent_X7 AKA J Star
    [/URL]image
    Notice: The views expressed in this post are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of MMORPG.com or its management.

  • FerusaFerusa Member Posts: 211

    Originally posted by CleffyII


    Hard to say how to upgrade if we don't know what your Motherboard is.  Your Motherboard is probably too old or incompatible with rescent parts considering that its a Dell.
    So it wouldn't be possible to upgrade my ram, video card, motherboard etc? I remember hearing something about that, and how dell kinda screwed customers over in that way.

     

    Though we have heard of stupid haste in war, cleverness has never been seen associated with long delays.
    -Sun Tzu, the Art of War

  • daelnordaelnor Member UncommonPosts: 1,556

    Dell uses very cheap parts in all but their highest priced computers. Otherwise you would have to pay a LOT more for that low end computer.

    Also, as soon as you take the side panel off of your case, you void any warranty you had with them, no matter how much money you spent on the warranty.


    You should be able to upgrade the ram and vid card at least. But if you upgrade the vidcard, I'd probably replace the powersupply. They probably slapped a generic 380 watt power supply in there.

    D.

    image

  • DeathpooperDeathpooper Member Posts: 265

    yup. more powerful powersupply may be required if you upgrade. This is the lesson for the future - build your own. I would get some cheap core duo, new p35 mobo, 2 gigs, 3850 for the amount you specified. And probably psu.

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