Making my pc better

When I bought my Dell over a year ago I thought I was getting a pretty good pc. Of course that was a long, long time ago when youre talking about computers. When I bought my pc i upgrade to what I thought I would need most. I got a dvd burner, 512 ram (which I no know u can never have to much ram), 2.8 with hyper threading, I even sprung 4 a 17 inch flat panel monitor. Now 4 what i was doing in the beginning my pc was a beast. 2 this day i haven't had any real major malfunctions. But after trying to do some new things these days, like playing pc games, I found that my pc is actually less than average. My psu maxes out at 250 watts which to find out doesn't support most of your quality video cards. I have onboard integrated video which absolutely sucks, and is why i looked into a new video card. My 512 ram that I thought was a decent upgrade has also been less than average lately. My speakers (that i upgraded 2 5.1 surround) constantly have static and humming. My pc slows way down when I try to run 2 many programs at once and so on. Dell quit making the 4600 series so uprade in the future arent looking good. I guess i could rant on for ever, but I should probably get to my ? How in the world can I spend this much money on a pc and still not have enough in it to play some games and run some programs without having hiccups. Bad graghics, slow programs, blah blah blah. My main ? is this. Im not into playing doom or half life or games of that nature that take alot out of your pc. But say some day I did want to. With my flat panel being able to handle 1024 x 768, 512 ram, 2.8 speed, integrated video, psu with 250 watts, what would have to do to be able to play them games with my pc. Without having to buy a new one.

 

find out if youv got a agp slot, if you do bung in a 6600gt etc and play them. If you dont, buy a new motherboard. Thats bout all you can do

 

Well if you have onboard graphix, i would doubt you have an agp slot,, a new mobo which should cost maybe 100 to 200 could do alot for ya, but with that, you would also need a graphics card, NVIDIA 5600 or higher could play those games easy, so your probably looking at close to 400-500 bucks to make you comp young and kicken again.. other then that, all i can say is system recorvery?? that might just make it faster once you got rid of alot of things.. but dont count on system recovery working,

 

Ustop, if you are taking DDP's advice, which he always has great advice, by the way, be careful trying to drop the Dell mobo into any new case; with Dell proprietary motherboards, they really do not fit into standard ATX form factor style cases. So, BEWARE! If you lived near me, I'd buy all your old parts; you could consider selling on Ebay and buy everything new with a nice super duper new Tower case with lots of room for extra drives, cards, 550+ Watt PSU, etc. etc. Dell machines are nice for the average User, and if you buy their Gaming machine you will pay $3K. ... my advice is to build your own.

 

Where can one get information on changing the powersupply for a Dell 4550 machine?? This is my second computer that my wife uses to run our home business but it's a pain in the ass to deal with proprietary components!! I couldn't even go to compusa to buy a regular 80mm case fan because the connector was proprietary, so I had to order a case fan from Dell...I'm pretty sure the power supply is the same way??

 

Ustop - take DDP's advice and give me the scrap parts from your old Dell (psu, mobo and case)!!!!!

Elusiv1, you may want to take DDP's advice too. I would call Dell for starters and price out a new PSU and then research on the internet to find out if you can find the same one cheaper. Let me know what you find out. .. not sure which Vendor Dell uses for their PSU's on the Dimension 4550....need to research it.

 

Hey ddp, I do appreciate the help u have givin me, I wasn't in anyway trying 2 ? u. I was just verifying 2 myself what I have found out the past 2 days. Except 4 surfin the net the pc is a over priced heap of junk that I can only bring up 2 date by strippin 4 parts and replacin with all new ones (basically). I orginally thought about building one from stratch but i couldn't come up with the $. That's where dell comes in. Besides even if u do build from stratch u can have a great pc 2day and by tomorrow its a dinosaur. Thanx for all your help guys. I learned alot about the world of technology.

 

I get that. I didn't buy my dell with $, I bought it with credit. I get the building from stratch. But dont u think when u spend 1300 bucks ( thats with 17" flat panel and dvd burner that was a big thing when I bought my pc,) that u should get a pc that can run a few pc games properly. Thats why I'm pissed. Yeah dell ripped me off but who doesn't. I get that I can change this and that and make my pc decent again, but what about tomorrow. If I do what you suggest than I will b spending another 5 2 600 bucks on top of what I have spent already. Then how many months b4 i have to spend another 5 to 600 bucks. I might as well order the dell xps for 3 grand, use it for a year, trash it and buy another one.

 

ustop that same pc now would be worth around 500 max. and you can play games (solitare, free cell, pong
However, in ordr to play new games, you need new parts, its as simple as that, the fact that you have to upgrade constantly to keep up is life. If you do as ddp suggested you wont have to shell out the full amount each time ie. buy a case, motherboard to suit your cpu, pcu, and good graphics card now, then in six to twelve months time, replace motherboard with new and new cpu but retain graphics card, psu, and everything else. Realisticly a new motherboard is good for around 2 upgrades

 

lies4love i would be very wary of classing a 5700 as up to date, hence the 6600 i stated (can be had for AUD$250 which is nothing compared to the $1000 monsters available yet give adequate quality)
Also, motherboards with a agp slot and on board video are quite common

 

Your PC is a DELL... theres your problem. wanna make it better, sell ya dell n look at http://www.eclipsecomputers.com and build your own

 

I understand u guys no the in and outs of pc's. But I shouldn't have referred to my pc as a heap of junk. Yes u guys could build a much better pc 4 a lot less, but other than trying to play certain games recently I haven't had any problems. I never intended on using it for playing high end games. That's really where the problem is. 4 everything else what I have is fine. If a person does what u guys suggest than why not just buy a playstation or xbox. I'm not trying 2 discredit what u guys have informed me about, but why go to such lengths just to play games on your pc. In the beginning I asked what it would take to play a game like tiger 2005 with better graphics and running some of the features. When I found out what I would need I flipped a lid. How could I possibly need all that to play a game. I Understand that that is the realism of it. U guys might think that I'm a real idiot, but the truth of it is this. When we decided that we needed a new pc my wife left it up to me to figure out what would be best. At first i did talk to some people about building my own. At the time I didn't have the internet via high speed. So my searching was limited and I kept 2 local stores. If I would have built the pc that I have now going through these local stores I would have spent twice as much if not more. Now understand that I knew nothing at the time about buying stuff over the internet or even about asking ?'s in forums like this. I was a complete idiot. I knew enough to find out about speed, fsb, ram size etc. But also wanted a dvd burner and flat panel. Sure u can buy a 8x burner now for 2 bucks but not then. Knowing that I didn't have enuf resources 2 build a pc I decided to go the route of buying prebuilt. I researched pc's for 2 MONTHS! For what I wanted, mainly the burner, I could not have gotten a better deal. Gateway seemed to me like they were going out of business, other pc's use the athlon which at the time i read over and over were better than intel but intel was catching up and would eventually pass up and it would be hard to find parts that would be compatible with athlon. Just some stuff I read. That was over a year and half ago. I never knew anything about video cards other than that was something, (computer geeks that still live at home) needed to play games on there pc. Sorry if I offended anybody. I get that u guys think dell is a joke and that u can build a pc twice as good for half the price, but most people can't. Does dell rip u off, yes. But like I said b4 who doesn't. I know I'm the one who asked the ? and u guys have been very helpful and I do appreciate that, but the answer I was looking for was to buy this card or that one or even just boost your ram. Not add this, switch out that and so forth. After reading all your replies I started thinking that this is a little idiotic isnt it? Is there any other reason to build your own pc then 2 play games? You know that there will be a doom 1000, half life 24, and gta:smokin crack. So every other year u have to jack up your pc 2 play games. I have 840 of my favorite classic nintedo games installe on my pc and they all play just fine, thanx for your help fellars, but i think I'll just stick with that. Peace out Home Skillet.

 

what it ever discovered if Ustop had an agp slot or not? i didn't see that anywhere on this thread, but i can be blind as a bat.