Need some help/advice

I recently received an older computer from a friend of mine and need some help with several things. Let me list out its specs first.

• Windows 7 64bit SP1
• ASUSTek EMERY 775 Motherboard
• Intel Pentium D 820 2.8Ghz
• 2GB DDR2 RAM
• BFG GeForce 8600 GT
• 500W PSU

First question is. Would upgrading the video card and the ram improve gaming performance? Which is what I am going to be using this computer for (diablo 3) I know it would improve but what I really mean is if I get these upgrades would the CPU hold me back. So really what I am asking is would I see a great improvement? I don't want or need a really good card I was thinking of going with either a GeForce 460 or Radeon HD 6770. By the way I have the BETA for this game and I can run it fine but I have to use almost all LOW settings and I get a few hiccups when there is a lot going on.

Second question is. If I upgrade the RAM can my motherboard support DDR3 or do I need to get DDR2?

Third question is. I downloaded Speccy by Piriform to see the temperatures etc... Everything is pretty solid (CPU floats between 35-40C, GPU 45-60C) but for some reason the hard drive is super hot 62-65C why is that and is there anything I can do to cool it down?

I would really appreciate any help or advice on this.

 

I would confirm this with somebody with more hardware experience but I do not think you will get much improvement with more ram and a newer graphics card as the processor is about 7 years old. I may be wrong though.

Your processor is 12th from the bottom of this chart. As you can see, the processor performance relative to newer processors is not very good.

 

Welcome to Majorgeeks Trav.

1. Yes. Yes. But probably not by as much as you would like and it won't bring it up to modern gaming standards.

2. No, DDR2 only, DDR3 is physically incompatible; Crucial.com is a good starting place for checking which RAM will work in your motherboard.

3. Speccy may not be accurate on your combination of hardware, over 60C is way too hot for comfort - that drive stores all your data, it can lose it faster than the PC boots up! Drives can often be relocated to a cooler area of the PC, lower is good; check to see if you can locate it where it has some free space around it for airflow.

Check the temperature and other stats of the drive with the trial version of Hard Disk Sentinel (an excellent tool).

The first thing that should be updated on that computer is the PSU.

Bottom line - how much $$$ do you really want/need to spend to get a decent performance from this 'old' PC? It may be better to hold off and save for a better unit.

 

The whole reason I even got it (for free) was to play Diablo 3, that's the only thing I will be using it for. I have a laptop which I am on now that I use as my main computer. I just can't game game on it because it has integrated graphics and its not to hot for gaming.

Anyways what % increase would you say I could see just by upgrading the video card and ram. I know it won't be up to "today's standard" I am just looking to get it up enough where the card can keep up when there is tons of stuff going on in the game.

I was gonna spend no more then $200 on it and that's it, I don't want to buy a whole new computer just to play one game ha.

Thanks for the information by the way on the hard drive, I installed that program and the temps were the same. The new PSU that is in there has a ton of extra cables smothering the hard drive and I think that is why it is getting so hot, it has no airflow going around it. I am gonna move it down and try and manage the cables out of the way and see if that gets it to cool down.

 

Moving to 4GB RAM, HD6770 and a quality 500W PSU will cost most of that $200. It should give in the region of 20-70% more performance, depending on the game engine(s) and whether you're then hitting the limits of the CPU.

 

Its already got a relatively new Corsair PSU in it and its 500W, why do I need to get a new one?

Those cards were just examples of what I was thinking about getting, I was gonna spend around $140 on a video card (looking at older cards but good ones that will just do what I need to which isn't much) and then just get some ValueRam or something cheap (4GB) which had me at just under $200

I also moved the hard drive down like you said and tucked away most of the extra cable, the rear fan is now pulling air through the front good and the hard drive temp is down almost 20 degrees. Motherboard, CPU and video card dropped by about 5 as well. So again, thanks for the tip.

I hardly ever have worked on computers, this is so much fun :-D

 

If it's a recent Corsair 500W it should be fine for an HD6770, if you move up to something like an HD6850, you really need a quality 550W+.

Don't go the 'value' RAM route, buy memory that's known to be compatible with your motherboard; again, Crucial.com ought to be your first port of call.

Nothing wrong with learning a new skill; heat kills computer components, keep an eye on those temps and an ear open for when the fans move up a gear - the better you know your computer, the faster you'll notice any changes and hopefully, prevent a disaster