To upgrade or not? 2

[Puck1987]

My computer is currently running with an AMD 1.33 ghz CPU, a gigabyte GA-7dx motherboard, and 256MB DDRAM. I've checked the specs for the motherboard and it will support up to an XP2000 (1.67 ghz). Query, is it worth the time and trouble to upgrade the CPU to an XP2000. Would I notice enough of a difference in the performance? I primarily use my computer for Office Applicatons and teaching through a univeristy online program. I'm planning on increasing the memory to 512MB regardless of what I do with the CPU. Thanks

Cheri

 

[Mulga]

Considering the work you are doing if the current CPU is a Duron and you go to an Athlon you may notice some difference, but not enormous, if the curent one is an Athlon then the performance gain will be so slight you will only detect it with benchmarking. You do not say what OS you are running, if it is XP then the RAM increase you mention is very worthwhile and you will notice considerable improvement, much more than for the CPU swap. On the other hand if you are running Win98 the RAM upgrade will not make any great difference, in fact it may even make it worse as 98 has been known to become unstable with that amount of RAM.

Help us to help you, please post back and tell us if this helped.
All things are possible except skiing through a revolving door.

 

[pmonett]

I agree. The RAM upgrade is far more worthwhile than the CPU for academic purposes.
Of course, if you have money to spare, a better CPU will not hurt. But without a demanding video application to demonstrate the improvement, you will not really see any difference in your day-to-day work with a CPU upgrade.
Your RAM upgrade will, however, give you immediate and satisfactory results.
As for Win98, I have had 512MB under 98SE without any adverse stability problems, but that is just me.

 

[Puck1987]

My OS is Win 2k and I posted a similar query in the OS forum about upgrading to XP Pro. The consensus there is that I should leave the OS I have well enough alone. It sounds like, other than increasing the RAM, the same is true for the hardware. Thanks. Both forums have probably saved me a few $$ and a lot of angst.

Cheri
barrister87@yahoo.com

 

[paparazi]

A friend of mine once gave me some advice and I think it bares true.
If you want to feel an PC upgrade has made a significant improvement in performance then don't bother unless you can at least double your CPU clock speed.
Going from a very capable Thunderbird 1.33DDR to an XP2.0+ (1.67ghz) would be noticable but certainly not significant, another 256mb DDR ram would be a slight boost and appear to make your machine run cleaner (less likely to run out of ram and stall writing to the hard drive)

I know this sounds really radical!! but for the price of that XP2.0+ CPU you could buy a cheap Via KT400 or Nforce2 chipset motherboard that will give you at least the boost of the processor upgrade and leave you with a much better upgrade path.
Into the bargain you would get USB2, Firewire, Built in Lan and possibly 5.1 digital audio possibility of card reader connections etc etc etc all for about the same price of an XP2.0+ CPU.
Admitadely it would involve alot more work but the faster chipset will give you at least the performance of your proposed CPU upgrade especially if you went with the Nforce2 option (Leadtek make a very cheap and reliable Nforce2 motherboard) others are quite a bit more money.
Martin

Replying helps further our knowledge, without comment leaves us wondering.

 

[jonhiker]

Looking at how you describe your usage, the RAM upgrade will do you better than the CPU upgrade.

 

[braddds]

Cheers paparazi

When asked to upgrade a system I always look at the motherboard first. What features, future upgrade paths, chipset, etc. Most people look only at the CPU and RAM thinking this will be the magic bullet then stick it on an inferior board...to save money...then wonder why their system fumbles, stalls and breaks! I've put together many pc's with descent CPU's and enough RAM (for their apps) on a great board that out performs so called 'higher' systems.

Beware of the bargin basement upgrades and full systems. The first place they cut is the motherboard.

Cheers

Thx to all who respond

 

[Puck1987]

Thanks for all of the feedback. This has been most educational. Tom's Hardware guide gave my motherboard fairly good reviews when it came out, so I think I'm going to stick with it for awhile longer. I'll upgrade the cpu when I'm ready to upgrade the motherboard as well.

Cheri