Alright. Here's the deal. I have a Dell Dimension 4550 desktop at this moment. I want to upgrade this, on the theory that upgrading the old system will give me a workable (if not spectacular) system. My total budget is preferably around 300 dollars, though I imagine that I could go over that if needed. Documentation That has a lot of the system specs. I have a Radeon 9500 Pro video card in it at present, and the rest is pretty much stock-it's a 2.4 GHz processor, I believe, with nothing else spectacular. It came with 256 MB of DDR SDRAM, and I've added a 512 stick as well, for a total of 700-something. My current possible intentions: I want to upgrade the RAM-if I can get it at a good price I'll replace one or both of the ram modules with 512, for 1 gig of ram. I think I read someplace that this particular model of computer doesn't support dual-channel ram, anyway, so... I want to upgrade the video card. It is, as the link will state, a 4x AGP slot, and I want the best I can get within reason. The current power supply is 250 watts-I can try replacing it if absolutely necessary. Bear in mind that I don't need a high-end gaming rig here, I just want to be able to run some newer games. I'd like to be able to run Oblivion or Fallout 3, for example. Lot of newer games (for me) that I'd like to be able to run.
Fallout 3, Minimum System Requirements: Windows XP/Vista 1GB System RAM (XP)/ 2GB System RAM (Vista) 2.4 Ghz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 256MB RAM (NVIDIA 6800 or better/ATI X850 or better) Recommended System Requirements: Intel Core 2 Duo processor 2 GB System RAM Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 512MB RAM (NVIDIA 8800 series, ATI 3800 series) Supported Video Card Chipsets: NVIDIA GeForce 200 series NVIDIA Geforce 9800 series NVIDIA Geforce 9600 series NVIDIA Geforce 8800 series NVIDIA Geforce 8600 series NVIDIA Geforce 8500 series NVIDIA Geforce 8400 series NVIDIA Geforce 7900 series NVIDIA Geforce 7800 series NVIDIA Geforce 7600 series NVIDIA Geforce 7300 series NVIDIA GeForce 6800 series ATI HD 4800 series ATI HD 4600 series ATI HD 3800 series ATI HD 3600 series ATI HD 3400 series ATI HD 2900 series ATI HD 2600 series ATI HD 2400 series ATI X1900 series ATI X1800 series ATI X1600 series ATI X1300 series ATI X850 series You should be able to run the game by upgrading your ram to 1 gig,and your video card to 256 or 512, most games these days takes a large video card.
Make sure to look for the AGP versions of these cards not the PCI-e lol. Oh, and I think you *will* need to upgrade the PSU, especially if you put in a juicy new video card. 250 watts is considered quite low. I'm guessing it's the generic one that came with the original comp? Some people (who probably know more about computers than I) place very high value on having a good PSU with ample watts. There are lots of sites out there that calculate a suggested wattage that you should have given system components. Just search for "power supply watts calculator" or some similar terms.
For the Graphics card, look into the ATI HD3850. I think that's the best AGP 4/8x card avalible. Not a spectacular card, but good enough to play Oblivion or Fallout 3. Also, you might need an upgrade in RAM. One gig should be good.
