[mikeng]

hey, first time posting here....

i got two used pc's from work, and am trying to decide which one to keep as my main home pc, and which one to use as my bro's backup box. the first is an old Dell Dimension 8200, P4 2.53 (prescott, I believe) with 512 RDRAM. all the RIMM slots are filled, i have 2x128MB PC1066 and 2x128MB PC800 in that box, and a wimpy Geforce MX 420 AGP card (i'm guessing 64mb ram?)

the other PC is a slightly newer HP pavilion 2000, P4 2.8 with ony 256MB DDR but one open slot, i think it's a 845GV board but whatever it is, it has no AGP slot. onboard video is my big concern...

i'm hoping not to have to fork out more than 150 bucks....i'm thinking of either:
1) keeping the dimension and getting 2x512MB sticks, replacing the PC800 sticks. problem is RDRAM hasn't come down in price, and it'll be fairly useless when i move out off the dimension

2) keep the pavilion, replace the Mobo with a cheap VIA/SIS microATX board (it's a micro case), buy a single stick of 1GB DDR400. that's around 130 but it doens't solve the problem with the video card....what cheap AGP card should I get?

3) keep the pavilion, just get a stick of 1gb DDR400 and a PCI video card. I know PCI video cards are "so yesterday" but i see a bunch of relatively new geforce 5200's and ATI rx300? that could be quite decent

i'm not a heavy gamer, i do muck around in GTA3 or GT3 every now and then but generally i'm just surfing the net with about 20 firefox sessions open, downloading music, burning CD's, IM'ing, loading my iPod and going through pictures from my digital camera. not a very taxing set of requirements...

suggestions GREATLY appreciated!!

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Well the pavillion will be the easiest to upgrade with cheap ram a gig of ddr is really cheap. A pci x300 might run GTA3 it is newer than a 5200 which probably wont play it as i have an agp version in my old comp and it struggles with the GTA games. The extra ram and speed on the pavilion coupled with the extrra ram would make it the obvious first choice even with the lack of a agp slot. Check the compatibility with ddr400 with the board though.

[warriorscot]

Well the pavillion will be the easiest to upgrade with cheap ram a gig of ddr is really cheap. A pci x300 might run GTA3 it is newer than a 5200 which probably wont play it as i have an agp version in my old comp and it struggles with the GTA games. The extra ram and speed on the pavilion coupled with the extrra ram would make it the obvious first choice even with the lack of a agp slot. Check the compatibility with ddr400 with the board though.

[mikeng]

are pci-x boards reverse compatible with old pci slots?

Well the pavillion will be the easiest to upgrade with cheap ram a gig of ddr is really cheap. A pci x300 might run GTA3 it is newer than a 5200 which probably wont play it as i have an agp version in my old comp and it struggles with the GTA games. The extra ram and speed on the pavilion coupled with the extrra ram would make it the obvious first choice even with the lack of a agp slot. Check the compatibility with ddr400 with the board though.

[warriorscot]

They have old pci slots if thats what you mean i have 4 pci slots, one pci-e x16 slot, one pci-e x4 slot and one pci-e x1 slot.

[mikeng]

sorry not very clear there, i meant can PCI-e vga cards be used (albeit at a reduced speed) in regular pci slots?

They have old pci slots if thats what you mean i have 4 pci slots, one pci-e x16 slot, one pci-e x4 slot and one pci-e x1 slot.