DScoots
join:2008-02-18
Oconto Falls, WI
|  Trying To Upgrade Old HP Pavillion 4350
I have a 10 year old HP Pavilion 4350. It was given to me as a strter computer a year ago, and I now love working on computers.
It come with Windows 98, 128 mb of RAM, and a 20 GB Hard drive.
I replaced the drive with a new 80 GB, installed a total of
512 MB of RAM, and managed to install XP Service Pack 2.
While it has much more crammed in it then was supposed to be possible, it is still mind numbingly slow, and the video
really bites! Games are nearly impossible to play.
Is there anything more I can do to try to improve the "choppy" video, and poor quality of game graphics? |
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xyxvv
@tds.net
| I can't find anything on the HP site, You probalby only have PCI, doubt you have a usable AGP card slot, I'd look at the PCI versions of the Geforce 6200, 5700 and the ATI x1300-1550 or HD2400 Pro, which is probably the fastest of the pack. Heres what the egg has »www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi···hInDesc=
You can use the current and previous years lists at Tom's to see about what the cards are capable of, but the PCI versions will be the slowest aside from maybe the new low end PCIe cards with Hypermemory or Turbocache which take part of the system ram as gpu ram causing a speed hit to pretty much everything. Check and see if you have AGP tho, if you can't get a new comp the AGP cards in the Geforce 7x00 and radeon X1k or HD2k series will be much better preformers.
But really, with a comp that old, even if you OC everything to the max it's not worth it to keep adding to it. Especially when it's only around $400 to build a comp from scratch. I'm looking at ordering this set that should only cost me $450 shipped »secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/wis···=8419228
Wont be playing Crysis or Bioshock at 100FPS with everything turned up, but since I run Linux it's more then capable for anything, maybe even Unreal Tournament 3 and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars if I turn them down. |
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xyxvv
@tds.net
| reply to DScoots
I should add for yah that XP is a bit heavy for 10 year old hardware, you may wanna try something like ReactOS »www.reactos.org/en/index.html which is an open source attempt at remaking Windows or you can try a really light weight Linux like Damn Small Linux »damnsmalllinux.org/ and add Wine »www.winehq.org/ which is an open source hackup of the Windows APIs to get Windows apps to run on Linux, you can check their compatibility lists for what games you wanna play, most old ones should work on either, tho the way Wine works things that may work on this version may not work on the next. |
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DScoots
join:2008-02-18
Oconto Falls, WI | Thanks for the answer and advice! |
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asdfdfdfdfdfdf
@Level3.net | reply to DScoots
You are really just throwing money away trying to upgrade a system like that. Best to save your money for a new system. |
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hurfy
Premium
join:2002-08-06
Spokane, WA
| reply to DScoots
Refurb or used computers for $200-250 for decent P4 with winxp. Even less on Ebay. Would be much better off starting with one of those. Everything will be faster than you can probably get an old computer upto. Even then it may still need a video card and some of these are still PCI only 
Gaming on a 98 level machine is gonna mean 98 level games. XP is only gonna make it slower and many newer games don't run on 98
I couldnt find out what exactly you started with either. Just how crippled is it?
(just bought some P4-3GHz refurb IBM from tigerdirect for $240 but no expansion space (use USB) and 1 PCI slot. With a decent PCI vid card would be a bearable game machine probably) |
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Duo Maxwell
What? Stop Looking At Me Like That
join:2003-03-31
Racine, WI
| Even that's ridiculously old, You'd be stuck with little to no upgrade path, outdated DDR ram, outdated CPU socket, outdated AGP slot, more then likely no SATA, sure you could make it a decent machine, but the cost involved is around the same as just getting the faster comp, this is what it'd take to make a mountain out of an old P4 mole hill:
$215 for a Radeon HD3850 »www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a···14102730
$101 2x 1Gb OCZ Platinum DDR400 »www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a···20227210
$95 for a Seasonic 500 Watt PSU with 8 pin PCIe connector for the HD3850 »www.newegg.com/product/product.a···17151034
Great graphics power sure, and a small mountain of ram sure, but it's already outdated and the CPU will still hold you back, it being a P4 and all it'd be prudent to also add to this list a nice heavy duty air cooler and maybe some better case fans.
Dumping money into either type of machine is probably not too great an idea unless you can get some of these parts 2nd hand or salvaged from other comps.
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Please visit »duo-maxwell.stumbleupon.com/ - »heatedebates.net/ - »microsuck.com/forums/index.php - »libertynewstv.com - »innworldreport.net/ - »freespeech.org |
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BobbytheBrain
@sbcglobal.net
| reply to DScoots
If the computer is actually 10 years old, it might have the specs like this when purchased new:
Pentium II 300mhz
128MB SDRAM
8.4GB HD
nVidia 4GB AGP Card
DVD-ROM
At that time, there was no such thing as a P4, DDR RAM, or SATA. The PII did used a slot for the processor, and the AGP card was probably the old 3v 2X type. Note that a system like this would cost about $3500 10 years ago. |
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BobbytheBrain
@sbcglobal.net | reply to DScoots
Sorry, I did not realize the P4 comments were not directed at the OP. My bad. |
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