I am currently running a socket s939 AMD athlon 3200+ 512k L2 cache (venice type I think).

I am still satisfied with the performance but I do not know wether it will cope with something like GTA4 when it will be released.

As the s939 processors are becomming extinct I have the feeling that if I want to upgrade I would need to do it on short notice.

The quickest one I can still find available is a 4000+ with 1024k L2 cache. For 36 Euro's

Can I consider this as a leap in performance?

This is the rest of my system:
MSI K8N neo4 motherboard
1GB memory DDR333 (mobo supports up to DDR400)
Geforce 7600GS 256MB graphics

That's a four year old computer, right? I think something like GTA4 will be unpleasant to run on that machine.

I wouldn't recommend upgrading just the CPU though. That thing's a dinosaur - better to save your money and go for a newer platform.

£20-ish isn't much but every € you spend on it is a € you spent for very little performance gain.

If all you need is a little more CPU power then great, but if it just doesn't work well in newer games it wont make much of a difference.

the fastest cpu you can get (bout 50 euros)

since your mobo has pci express you can get pretty much any graphics card you want. wouldn't go as far as a 48x0, i'd say a 3850 maybe. ok, maybe the 4850 if the games you play are more dependant on a gpu than a cpu.

pros: you give some money now and you get decent performance. you can keep the graphics card.
cons: you have less money for the next pc

as a temporary solution it is ok.

also get a couple 1GB dimms

Thanks guys,

I know I will need to invest in a new pc eventually.

My current PC I built on a very tight budget about 2 years ago. I am not planning on assembling a new one on short notice.

It runs LFS and GTA san andreas excelent on almost maximum settings. I would love to run GTA4 as soon as it is released for PC but won't buy a new one just to be able to run it.

If I was that desperate I would allready have bought a PS3 for it (and sacrified the relationship with my girlfriend).

I will wait and see wether my PC exceeds the minimum specs for it when it's released.

Quote from Joris :

I would love to run GTA4 as soon as it is released for PC but won't buy a new one just to be able to run it.

I'm sick of the requirements of new games too. Especially given that there's only one game or so each year that I even care about playing.

Quote from thisnameistaken :

I'm sick of the requirements of new games too. Especially given that there's only one game or so each year that I even care about playing.

Very true. I have been unfaithfull to LFS for a maximum of 2 weeks when trying another racing game. The only game series that can keep me entertained is the GTA-series.

guys. you know, you are not forced to play the game at maximum settings with AA pushed to maximum and at ridiculous resolutions.

game requirements are high but they are elastic, meaning you can drop the res down to 1280x800 (or 1280x720) and lower AA.

I can easily live with playing at mediocre settings. I just hope my current PC will exceed the minimum specs.

For some reason LFS seems to be the only game that seems to get leaner with every update. My FPS seems to have increased with the past two patches. Is Scavier the only development team that don't have shares in Intel, AMD or NVIDIA?

Quote from george_tsiros :

guys. you know, you are not forced to play the game at maximum settings with AA pushed to maximum and at ridiculous resolutions.

game requirements are high but they are elastic, meaning you can drop the res down to 1280x800 (or 1280x720) and lower AA.

Yeah but you cant get the real feeling of the game with low settings..

not low. medium. instead of 1600x1200 with 4xAA and 16xAF you can go to 1280x720 no AA, 8xAF (example). i doubt you will lose THAT much...

Quote from george_tsiros :

not low. medium. instead of 1600x1200 with 4xAA and 16xAF you can go to 1280x720 no AA, 8xAF (example). i doubt you will lose THAT much...

You can get away with dropping res on a CRT perhaps, but an LCD away from it's native res or one that's an appropriate factor of it will look poor.

I occasionally run some older things that can't go at 1920x1200 and if there isn't a good scale in the choices available then it's pixellated to hell.

play with GPU scaling of image, maybe that will work better.

maybe i am lucky, because i enjoy a game even if i play it at 1024x768 without AA (one thing i never turn off is AF. ever since i got a card that had texture filtering i always... always pushed it to the maximum. an other thing i never ever turn off is VSYNC and shadows.)

what i enjoy even more, though, is my pc to be silent. i am almost there, GPU and CPU cooling is done with a single coolermaster 12cm fan that runs at 300rpm or something (according to bios) and the PSU is cooled with an other 12cm fan that gets 5V.

why do my seagates make so much noise

Quote from thisnameistaken :

I'm sick of the requirements of new games too. Especially given that there's only one game or so each year that I even care about playing.

Exactly! I should be able to play Crysis on my Apple II...