[silverwolf]

ok i have hte problem with everyother outdated machine. i have jerkyness in FSO. and yes i have all the high memory usage stuff off save for glowmaps. so my question is what should i upgrade first. my system spec are below:

Intel celeron processor running at 900Mhz
an intel 810 chipset.
Geforce2 PCI(don't have any AGP slots)
and approx. 383MB of ram

if you need any other info tell me and i can give it to you

[Trivial Psychic]

I assume the "383" was refering to your system ram, which is probably 384 MB acutally.  What's your ram speed?

Unfortunately, your weak link is probably your motherboard and the lack of AGP.  For a while, my AGP GF2MX 32MB was running in PCI mode, until I found that out.  Installing AGP drivers managed to boost my speed considerably.  If you're looking for a cheap upgrade, find some used motherboard and a GF4 or something.  Make sure that both your RAM and CPU are compatible with your new MB.  If you'd rather not have to pay for an upgrade just yet, there is an alternative.  I found that (during my brief PCI phase) that I got acceptable performance when running in OGL mode.  Just remember that it won't display jpg, tga, or dds reliably.  Its always best to use one of Taylor's builds for OGL.

Hope this helps.

Later!

[silverwolf]

how do i find out my ram speed?
for the record i would point out my only source of money is $20 monthly allowence so I would like to make the upgrade as cheap as possible(meaning only buying 1 componet)

[Trivial Psychic]

If you know how to navigate around in your BIOS, it should say what your ram speed is.  I'm guessing your system bus is 100 MHz. since you've got a 900 MHz. CPU, but around that time they were splitting the 2 buses.  Your RAM could be 66 MHz.  If you're just getting $20 a month, I'd still suggest upgrading those 2 components, but not all at once.  Upgrade your motherboard to an AGP-equipped model first, but you shouldn't notice any major improvements until you can get an AGP card to go along with it.  I don't realy follow Intel hardware anymore so I couldn't reccomend any good board ATM.  Best wait for someone more informed to post.

As far as your current performance is concerned, I'm not sure if the -pcx2dds flag works in OGL mode, but it sure smoothed things out in D3D mode.  It drops your overall framerate slightly, but irons out many stutters by converting the pcx files to dds ones that remain compressed in video memory.

Later!

[silverwolf]

anyone else have suggestions?

[Fractux]

I duuno, IMHO It's really not worth putting money into your system.

I would just play those campains you can with FS2 vanilla, and other FSO campains with all the options off.

Your getting 20 bucks a month right?

So in one year, let's say you'll get 240$. I'll push that limit a bit, because at this point, I wouldn't recoment anything less for the sake of future upgrades you may wish to make, and bang for your buck.

OK, first off, go take a look at AnadTech's weekly buyer guide for an entry level system. It's not going to be able to handle the latest and greatest, but if you don't have any cash and you really want to upgrade your computer it's a good place to start.

http://anandtech.com/guides/showdoc.aspx?i=2159&p=1

Check out these prices from the last page of that article (they include shipping costs):

-CPU & Cooling     AMD Athlon XP 2500+ (cooling included)     $86
-Motherboard    ASUS A7N8X-X (nForce2 400)    $65
-Memory     1 X 256MB Crucial PC3200     $47 (double that 512 = ~94$ or a bit cheaper if you get 1 DIMM)

Throw in a Radeon 9200 (if you want to play games DO NOT go for SE cards with cut memory bandwidth) for 54$

You need to get a new power supply with that, so I'll throw in a ballpark figure of 50$ [For a quality one - don't get a cheap one.]

That's ~$302 with 256MB ram, CPU, Graphics Card, MB and PS. Maybe you can get your source of income to front you some money, and pay it off. ( or do some odd jobs for people to get some cash. Lawn mowing helped pay for my first computer. )

If you shop around, I'm sure you can get some good deals. You'll definitely want the best vidcard you can get, and as much memory as you can afford. If you can, go for a CPU with a 333FSB (if you go AMD, which, on a bugget, still captures the best. YOu may wish to look at the AMD Semprons, their budget line, which are basically Athlon XP's with the same cache as the Thouroughbreds 256k)

Here's a good place to look (if you're in the states that is): http://www.newegg.com/

Cheers!

[Tepa]

uhm guys that setup sounds like brandcomp eg. Hp,Dell,Fujitsu,Compaq...etc not much upgradeable and definantly not worth the trouble to upgrade just the friggin old pc66,100,133 sdram sticks costs a fortune thesedays.
as Fractux posted save $$ and get new parts and build new comp tho u gotta add new case/PSU for that list brandcomps dont have exactlybest cases'+PSU's

[Moonsword]

E-Machines are fairly upgradeable in my experience.  THe biggest problem is that some of them don't have AGP slots.

[Kosh]

Custom built systems are the most upgradable you can get.