HI

I am trying to upgrade my computer.

The thing is that i know little to nothing about computers,so please sacrifiece some of your time and help me out.

thanks vary much.

Here is some informations about my computer:

Brand and Model: Sony Vaio/PCV-RX550

Processer: Intel Pentium(R)4 1.5GHz with 256MB of RAM(i upgraded to 512MB already)

Windows: XP Home Edition

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So: What do I need to do to make it faster. so that i can do many thing at once.(keep many programs open and runing at the same time)

And here is some Questions:

What do i need to do about the Mother bord? what does it does?

what is CPU? what do i need to make it faster?

is it posible to upgrade my compuer to Intel Pentium4 3GHz.

do i need to upgrade my RAMS too, if my computer can be upgraded to 3GHz.

If i upgrade my RAM. what should it be,(how many MB or GB) so it will be the best?

where can i find these mother bord and RAMS? (please list some sites that sells them. if posible.(new, not used ones.) if posible

that all. thanks for reading My Question.

P.S: if i missed anything that i need to do inorder to upgrade my computer,please tell me.

Thanks agian

-- SLI (shuli207@msn.com), July 11, 2004

Answers

By the way. my computer uses SDRAM. for got to tell that from the obove.

is it even possible to upgrade my Old SDRAM to the faster DDR-RAM?

-- SLI (shuli207@msn.com), July 11, 2004.

First thing first, What do you want to do with your computer? Your computer is fine, the cpu and memory meet the minimum requirement for Doom 3... LOL (just a doom joke!) The only weak part I see in this computer is the graphic card (TNT2 M64 from what I see). If you want to make it a gaming computer, buy a new graphic card and your computer will be fine for another year. Graphic card... ATI 9600 XT or Nvidia...ugh... better wait for their new line of product for this autumn. However, if you want to have a computer for video editing (to make the "Finding Nemo 2" or "Star Wars 3.5"), you'll probably need a computer 3.x Ghz, at least 1 GB of Ram and another fat hard disk to have some special effect with light saber.

The suggestin that I can give you is: buy a new graphic card for now, save money for another year (600-700US) and buy a new computer for the next year. Put your new graphic card on the new computer and you'll have 2 computers. A lot of new stuff coming and they will become "reasonable price" for the next summer. (something like 64 bits cpu, pci express, dual layer dvd burner, ddr2, etc.

I'll try to answer your question the easiest way. It will be easier if you have a friend that can show you what's inside of your compurter.

What do i need to do about the Mother bord? what does it does?

Res:The motherboard is the backbone of your computer. You put your cpu, memory, graphic card or sound card on it. It's just a board with a chipset that controls the communication between all the pieces. The board will also determine what is the fastest cpu you can have on it and what kind of memory you can use.

what is CPU? what do i need to make it faster?

Res: CPU is like the heart of your computer. It determines how many instructions it can calculate for second. Usually you make it faster by buying a new one. Some people will overclock the cpu, make it go faster than the regular speed. You better do a lot of reading if you want to know how to do it (it depends also if your motherboard let you do it)

is it posible to upgrade my compuer to Intel Pentium4 3GHz.

RES: I don't think it's possible with this motherboard. At the same time, you really don't want to put a P4 3Ghz on this board, because it's using Sdram 133 which is a very slow memory to match with P4.

do i need to upgrade my RAMS too, if my computer can be upgraded to 3GHz.

Res: Stay with 512 MB with this motherboard. I don't see if this board can take more than 512 Mb.

If i upgrade my RAM. what should it be,(how many MB or GB) so it will be the best?

Res: When you buy your computer for the next summer, go with 512Mb or 1Gb. There's not gurantee that memory will be cheap at that time. Memory price is like the gaz price, they just don't follow any logic. (14 yrs ago, I was so damn happy about 2 MB of RAM on my 386...sigh)

where can i find these mother bord and RAMS? (please list some sites that sells them. if posible.(new, not used ones.) if posible

Res: I don't live in US and I don't know where do you live. It seems that people in US just love to pass by www.newegg.com for computer hardware. It's a reasonable price, but there's always a chance for lower price used parts on ebay.

-- Andy Tsao (nohead88@yahoo.com), July 12, 2004.

no, it really won't help anyway. Since the amount of RAM is just use for "Free Memory" to run programs. I'm sure if you somehow got 2gb of ram in your computer, you could run 40 programs at one time, but then again WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO? if you want to make your computer run more efficiently, then upgrader the cpu and get a intel xeon 2.4. Any if you're a hefty downloader, then don't bother upgrading your interior harddrive, get a few 120gb external hardrives to back up some stuff, no more messy cd-rs and dvd-rs. Well, at least that's what i do...

-- Pearson (none@aol.com), July 15, 2004.