Cheap Upgrades?

Unfortunately, my friend is stuck with one of those $400 dells thats about a year old. It has no graphics card, 256mb ram, and only PCI slots (NOT PCI express). Well considering the limited options for his computer, and the fact that he's probably not gonna buy a new one how well would these upgrades be?

BFG Tech Geforce 6200 OC

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=7638292&st=geforce&lp=5&type=product&cp=1&id=1130987962366

1GB Corsair Value Select

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145505&Tpk=corsair%2bvalue%2bselect

That would bring his total RAM to 1280mb.

He has a normal 17 inch 4:3 LCD display with max resolution of 1280x1024.

How well would this computer be able to play games like Half Life 2 and Source Mods, and Far Cry, and at what resolutions?

I don't think it's worth the hassle to find out his processor and FSB, find a mobo with better integrated graphics (I know nothing about integrated), then take off the weird CPU vent in his case etc.

Can someone suggest a good PCI card. If it could play half life 2 at 1024x768 with med/low settings it would be great. If it couls do better that would be gladly accepted.

The only reason I suggested the 6200 was because people were telling me it was better than a certain card, and they also have like 5 of them at Best Buy that probably aren't going anywhere fast.

bump

BTW, the oc one from Best Buy is apparently faster than all other 6200s on Newegg.

This is what i told another guy.

For the Price of your RAM upgrade for your old system you can get a new one together.

I recently upgraded some family members and some friends that had virtually no money for upgrades to ASRock 4coredual SATA2 boards that support DDR1, DDR2, AGP 8X and PCI-E 16X@4x mode support and added a Intel Allendale E2160 proc (BSEL modded to 2.7Ghz) and 2GB DDR2 PC6400 RAM(running at boards max of 667Mhz). All for $160 from NewEgg. This upgrade allowed me to use their old RAM and video card if needed and still see the blistering speed jump in the proc tech from their AMD64s.

Also it leaves you with a good upgrade path.

I would suggest adding a Radeon HD 4850 PCI-E for video at your leasure after the upgrade I mentioned above to awesome 3D video accelleration.

Motherboard (ASRock 4CoreDual SATA2): http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157115R / $39.00 Open Box (MB Only) and $59.00 Retail Box (Added Cables and I/O Shield)
Motherboard Review: http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=3024&p=1

CPU (Intel Dual Core E2160): http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116036 / $67.99 (better overclocker that E2180 and larger stock heatsink)

RAM (OCZ ATI CrossFire 2GB): http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227169 / $45.99 but $25.99 after $20.00 mail-in rebate.

Video Card: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102747 / $179.99 but $149.00 after $30.00 mail-in rebate.
Video Card Review: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-4850,1957.html

Here is the BSEL Mod info to overclock your CPU on the cheap motherboard, I have done this on several upgrades I have done. (It works Great!!)
CPU Voltage MOD: http://sg.vr-zone.com/?i=3904
CPU FSB MOD: http://www.techspot.com/gallery/showphoto.php/photo/1887/cat/500/ppuser/25139
(This will bring the E2160 to 1066 FSB from 800 and Overvolt the CPU to 1.4v.)

You can test stability and temp by running Orthos and monitor the CPU temp to make sure it stays under 60c using Intel Thermal Analysis Tool. To make sure you have a stable system. You should be able to get the CPU to go from 1.8Ghz to 2.7 no prob with 3.2Ghz Max. Google overclocking E2160.

This comes to a total of:

System Upgrade: $152.98 and after rebates $102.98
Video Upgrade: $179.99 and after rebate $149.99

It's so cheap to upgrade these days, it's time to throw away the old and get the new.

The DDR RAM upgrade you are talking about to just get 2GB DDR1 is around $150.00 so id say upgrade the whole thing.

One day when you are ready for a new better motherboard you can splurge and all the above parts will perform even better.