Un-Upgradeable? Only Vid Card & RAM

[Chronologix]

I recently went out to find out how i could upgrade my PC. And was told that the only upgradeable hardware was my Video Card and Memory without having alot of compatibility issues to deal with.

Current Specs:

Processor: Intel Celeron D 3.2Ghz
Mobo: Intel D915GAV PCIe
Video Card: Radeon x1650pro 512Mb
RAM: 3Gb Kingston DDR2
PSU: 450watt (i think...the sticker on the PSU says 473)
OS: Windows XP Media Center

I wanted a decent gaming rig, and by the looks of it, it should be decent, but still runs pretty sluggishly for even some older games, and just basic OS navigation, which is what is leading me to try and upgrade.

So the things i am asking is:

1.) Is the rig currently un-upgradeable for the CPU etc. without having incompatible mobo and memory?

2.) Is there something that may be causing this current setup to run worse than it should be?

Any advice on upgrading etc. would be appreciated. If you guys need any more info I will try and figure out how to get it

EDIT: Ok i looked up the mobo and it turns out it only supports P4 and Celeron D (which sucks) so should that be my first step? will this cause many compatibility issues? Cost alot etc.?

 

[mailpup]

You can upgrade the CPU to a better P4 on the list. Just be sure you have a compatible BIOS or upgrade to it. The applicable versions are on the list. The Celeron you now have is not a gaming processor.

You'll probably notice the most improvement when you upgrade your graphics card. It appears you have a PCI-E x16 slot so you have many choices. Do you have a budget?

 

[Chronologix]

I kind of have a budget, I am not really into buying the most high tech expensive things to rule over all others. I just want to find something that is relatively cheap but not too cheap, but will still last me a while.

Is the x1650pro really that bad? (This concerns me since i just recently purchased it about a month or 2 ago -.-)

I thought the largest problems would have been the PCU and the Power Supply.

Do you think finding a P4 would be difficult now with all the dual/quad cores flooding the market for numerous pre-made PCs and manufacturers?

You also said something about a compatible BIOS etc. I recently updated the BIOS using one of the software packages Intel provides on their site.

Also how can i make sure the PCIe is set to x16 instead of x1, i just want to make sure.

 

[CobaltViper]

I have a 700Pro and a P4 2.4Ghz processor and I can play most older games fine, Oblivion is where it gets too hot for my PC to handle, so I would advise you to get a P4 processor.

 

[pdyckman@comcas]

Your Video card is not an intensive gamer. It is GDDR2 with 128 bits. The bandwidth is 12.8 GB/sec. You could improve that to a 256 bit card with GDDR3 and more like 30 or 40 GB/sec bandwidth. You have plenty of ram (3 GB). It would be helpful to know what speed your ram modules are. 533mhz/667mhz/or 800 mhz. Pentium D does have a bad name but I'm assuming that you have the 9xx series (925 or something like that). If you are running the 9xx series that's not nearly as bad as the 8xx series. Fairly acceptable. I've run the 3.4 Pentium 945 and it kept up with a fast graphics card. Good Luck.

 

[Chronologix]

Your Video card is not an intensive gamer. It is GDDR2 with 128 bits. The bandwidth is 12.8 GB/sec. You could improve that to a 256 bit card with GDDR3 and more like 30 or 40 GB/sec bandwidth. You have plenty of ram (3 GB). It would be helpful to know what speed your ram modules are. 533mhz/667mhz/or 800 mhz. Pentium D does have a bad name but I'm assuming that you have the 9xx series (925 or something like that). If you are running the 9xx series that's not nearly as bad as the 8xx series. Fairly acceptable. I've run the 3.4 Pentium 945 and it kept up with a fast graphics card. Good Luck.

Well the RAM is:

Front Side Bus: 4x 133Mhz (532Mhz)
Memory Bus Speed: 2x 200Mhz (400Mhz)

Im not exactly sure what that means, it is just what is displayed in Sandra.

If it is any consolation i have 2 different "brands" on RAM in there, the Original 1 Gb (2 512Mb sticks) and the 2 recently added 1Gb Kingston sticks that all together fill up 4 slots.

I was also looking around some places and found this: http://www.upgradebay.com/c1_itemdetail.asp?itemid=168714477. Would that be compatible and be a good investment?