Upgrade the current computer, or buy a new one?

[jedi]

I bought my computer a couple of years ago, and was going for inexpensive, basic stuff to play poker on. Now the computer is running a little slow, I'm guessing partially because I'm multi-tasking on it so I'm trying to see if I need to upgrade the computer, or just get a new one. Now that I've made some money with poker, it might be time to spend it.

Current setup

Dell Dimension 2400 running Windows XP 2002
Celeron Processor 2.4 GHz
256MB RAM
74GB Hard Drive
1 monitor. (CRT)

I'm thinking at the minimum to get some more RAM, but a new monitor would be nice (reading about your 2001FPs). But if I start doing that, should I just get a new computer?

-Jedi

[fluxrad]

Just get more RAM. a 2400 is fine for anything except gaming (and sometimes even that).

[kenberman]

you probably know this, but the monitor purchase is a separate decision than the computer purchase.

I would probably add more ram, it's a cheap and easy upgrade.

[TylerD]

I had a very similar PC to you (except I had 512MB RAM, a pentium and a Dell 2001FPS). I added 1GB of RAM and it improved the performance greatly.

[grimel]

relatively cheap 1 gig ram upgrade - note shipping is included

zip zoom fly site

[krimson]

Upgrading to 1GB of Ram will give you a huge boost. The Celeron 2.4 is kind of low-end but should do.

I don't see any reason to buy a whole new system if your not into gaming, since your paying quite a bit extra for a new mobo, video card, etc when you don't really need it to play poker.

[astroglide]

that cpu is T R A S H. more ram will help. is you hard drive naturally 74gb or 80gb? it would be pretty odd to have a raptor in that rig.

the answer is "it depends on how much money you have", but if $400 or whatever doesn't bug you just get a cheap p4 around 3ghz and have 1gb of ram too. see techbargains.com.

[Terry]

You may or may not be able to upgrade the CPU. Dell won't help you and they do not recommend that you do it. If you do change it, you are very likely to have overheating problems and/or power supply problems.

The budget Dell systems are intentionally designed to not be upgraded. Michael Dell is of the opinion that anyone who would want to take the cover off his computer and change something inside is a member of some sort of lunatic fringe. He seems to have softened somewhat lately by making RAM upgrades available.

That said, 256MB of RAM is simply not enough to run Windows XP. XP itself may be using over 200MB. Adding RAM will make a huge difference on your machine, but it will still be a low-end computer. It is the only upgrade even worth considering.

[AA suited]

you said multitasking.. what are you running in the background?

best bang for the buck upgrade is to buy another 256megs ram.

for just playing poker, my p3-500mhz laptop w/384megs ram, and external monitor 4 tables great.

my sempron 2500 w/512megs ram is slow as a dog w/pokertracker in the background and 6 tabling.

you can also set the cpu priorities on your programs in WinXP. see if that helps.

[jedi]

I'm running stuff like Microsoft Word and Excel, plus a movie on occasion.