Help! What should I upgrade?

[danielf]

My current is system is:
AMD Athlon XP 2500+ Barton
Kingston 512MB HyperX Dual Channel (2-2-2)
ABIT Siluro Geforce4 64MB TI4200

I have money for 1 upgrade. What should I upgrade?
I am a gamer and want to play doom3, halflife2 and battlefield2 when they come out.

I have done some research and I´m considering changing my CPU to a Barton 3000+ or my video board to a Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB.

Any advice?

Thanks a alot.

 

[kevinflames]

I hear people saying you should have 1gb ram for hl2. but if you can only get one upgrade radeon 9800 i think

 

[newbiepcuser]

For your purpose: Video Card then RAM. RAM prices are currently pretty high, so I would do the video card first and then RAM when you see a HOT deal.

 

[DKlein]

Another vote for video card first, RAM second.

 

[SickBeast]

Originally posted by: danielf
I have done some research and I´m considering changing my CPU to a Barton 3000+

Run your FSB at 200mhz and you'll have a 3200+ for free. The 3000+ is pointless for you.

 

[wseyller]

I play battlefield alot (Desert combat and battlefield vietnam). This game uses more than 512mb of ram. Depending on what maps loads up I use anywhere from 70 to 95 percent of 1GB of ram which is displayed on an LCD installed in my tower. Before I even execute the game I'm using around 20 percent of 1GB of ram. Its possible you might get some lag spikes from having to use virtual memory in addition to the system memory.

But before you add more ram, you system will improve much more with a 9800 pro.

The last thing I would upgrade is the processor.

 

[spaceghost21]

I agree with everyone else here, upgrade your video card than your RAM, if you're comfortamble with overclocking your CPU I'd do that to but just becareful. Right now the 9800 is at a great price.






SpaceGhost

 

[yadda]

Another for 9800 Pro....:laugh: