I was about to upgrade my system but I want to be able to play all the new games, not at their highest but medium ranged settings. My specs are
1.3 AMD Athlon
256MB DDR400 (runs at 266 because of motherboard)
3 HDD(20GIG-ATA100 7200RPM, 10GIG ATA100 5400rpm, 8GIG ATA33 unknown RPM
Radeon 7200 64 Megs SDR ram
nforce 220-D
no sound card!
Plexwriter cdburner
CDROM
250Watt PSU-Needs upgrading!

What needs upgrading the most so I can play the newest games.

Every thing get at least amd athlon xp 2100+
with 256+128 mb ram and Ati radeon 9600 pro/xt / geforce fx 5600 bcz todays games requires more than that u will be able to run new games (some) from low to medium and get a on-board sound card some games even wont run with out sound .

with that specs of yours...i'd say upgrade your mobo, cpu, ram, gfx card, get a pci sound card...oh well it's pretty much everything..LOL...sell that ol baby and get yerself a hi-end rig...like Athlon64 maybe...

peace,
~evans~

lol, is this supposed to be a joke? my computer is a total POS and its better than that thing. you pretty much need a new everything, the only things i'd hold back on are the HDs and the CD-Rom drives, maybe the cpu, everything else is crap though. actually... that cpu sucks, you could get one thats a lot better for like 50 bucks

FBI_Agent

I agree with everyone but i think i will upgrade the POS motherboard first. the thing sucks 3 PCI and one AGP! it does have onboard everything though, it was a good pc back in its day... sort of.

what do you think of this as an upgrade

PSU=400W
Motherboard=Nforce2 Ultra
CPU=XP2500
VidCard=Radeon9600 Pro

I can't upgrade everything at once but if i make those upgrades how much better would it be.

"PSU=400W
Motherboard=Nforce2 Ultra
CPU=XP2500
VidCard=Radeon9600 Pro"

That is pretty much everything in your situation. Looks like you read Mohsin's response.

Go for it.

Skip

get at least amd athlon xp 2100+ ($80)
If you want to play games with really good graphics + good smoke effects you will need ATI Radeon 9000 64mb($50)get more ram 512mb ($100), and depends what processor u get you will need a new motherboard (make sure it has NForce 2 chip)i would recomend gigabyte 7N400 really good board for money($70)

peace

madrussian lol the radeon 9000 sucks.

http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031229/vga-charts-03.html#unreal_tournament_2003

(well this is a pro)

For about 80-90$ you can get a geforce 4 TI4200 128mb that will kick a 9000s a**.
512mb of ram is the minimum for todays games. your HDDs are fine, and get a minimum of a 2000+ Athlon XP and a ABIT NF7 mobo. the NF7 has onboard 5.1 sound and a NFORCE chipset. Get an 400W antec PSU and you should be runnin smothly.

All this will run you bout 190-200 Bucks if you shop at newegg.
PS: The NF7 HAS Alot OC'in abilitys
GL MAN

.

BUtta My Fries

i got Gigabyte 7n400 pro 2 motherboard. It has audiology z5 on board which is 7.1 dolby. It cost about $120
Maybe u right that ti420 is better than ati 9000
try getting ati 9600xt (its on sale now at pcclub.com)

peace

Get an Athlon 2500 mobile, and a thermaltake Volcano 12. Get some CAS 2.5 PC3200 RAM. Proceed to overclock to 3200 specs or beyond. Mine is running at 2.4GHz (3200's run 2.2GHz).

Definitely an NForce2 motherboard, although those can be had for $60 right now. I don't see how that gigabyte is a good deal if you can get say an Albatron motherboard for $60, and an Audigy for $60. I'd rather have an audigy for gaming myself.

newegg.com is your best bet for that stuff right now except the V12 heatsink and fan xocide.com has them on sale for $22.

As for video cards, Ti4200 isn't gonna run DX9 stuff very well. I'd go for an ATI 9600 pro/xt. Better yet, if you can afford it, there are some 9800 Pros out there for as little as $160 (although those aren't usually full fledge ones, and DON'T buy 9800 SE's, they suck). The Sapphire 9800 Pro 256-bit for $200 can be flash modded to an XT.

Just some ideas.

MCSE, MCSA Messaging, baby!