Advice on upgrading my computer.

[TchuBacha]

Ive decide to upgrade my machine so i run Windows Vista (Dual booted with Win XP) but im not sure if the components ive picked out are compatible with my machine. My reason for upgrading for Vista is that my college has this license where i can purchase any Microsoft software from them cheaper than i can get it in the shops.

This is may computer at the moment. lol i know its a pile of sh!te but it does what i want it to do.

Ive been looking at the geforce FX GPU's as they are compatible with Vista Aero Glass. Which is the best Graphics Card to choose (Nvidia or ATI) and will AGP 8X FX cards work in AGP 4X slots?

Also my computer has 256MB of PC133 SDRAM so i guess ill need to buy alot more RAM. I looked around on ebuyer and they have 512 sticks at around the £30 - £40 price range but im not sure which brand is the most reliable to purchase.

Overall im looking to spend around £70 on more RAM and a Graphics Card (Nothing to special as i dont play any games on my machine other than through emulators, many just Firefox, WMP and MSN Messenger)

[Jale]

Ive been looking at the geforce FX GPU's as they are compatible with Vista Aero Glass. Which is the best Graphics Card to choose (Nvidia or ATI) and will AGP 8X FX cards work in AGP 4X slots?

Get PCI-Express ones instead. They support up to 16X. And yes, 8X cards work on 4X AGP slots.

Also my computer has 256MB of PC133 SDRAM so i guess ill need to buy alot more RAM. I looked around on ebuyer and they have 512 sticks at around the £30 - £40 price range but im not sure which brand is the most reliable to purchase.

To run Vista smoothly you need at least 1 GB of RAM. About the brand, I know Kingston and Corsair brands are the best. Oh, and buy 1 GB stick instead of two 512 MB sticks.

[onewecallgod]

Get PCI-Express ones instead. They support up to 16X. And yes, 8X cards work on 4X AGP slots.

He can't do that because his motherboard doesn't have PCI-E.

After looking at the specs, I'm really wondering if you're serious about upgrading it. First of all, for 70 quid, you're not even going to come close to being able to run aero glass. Even if you put 500 quid into upgrades, you still wouldn't be able to do it since the platform is so old. The CPU is quickly going to be a bottleneck, as is front side bus and ram transfer speeds.

[TchuBacha]

He can't do that because his motherboard doesn't have PCI-E.

After looking at the specs, I'm really wondering if you're serious about upgrading it. First of all, for 70 quid, you're not even going to come close to being able to run aero glass. Even if you put 500 quid into upgrades, you still wouldn't be able to do it since the platform is so old. The CPU is quickly going to be a bottleneck, as is front side bus and ram transfer speeds.

Scrap that idea then. I knew it was a bit optimistic of me to think i could get vista on my computer but i was worth a try. Thanks anyway.

[Jale]

You can also try this...