dilemma in choosing upgrade option

[edwuave]

i own a pathetic MSI K8MM-V mobo plus sempron 2500++ palermo processor, why i call the mobo pathetic is that it didn overclock AT ALL. no option in bios to do so either,and when im trying to overclock in windows using clockGen, even a slight 50MHz increase in FSB will crash the whole system.
sempron processors particularly the new palermo core overclock very well, so the cpu isn't the problem that holding me from overclocking. the problem lies on the mobo.
therefore, i decided to change only the motherboard, so that i can overclock it to maybe 300FSB which is equal to 1200MHz of hypertransport and 2100MHz cpu speed(from the original 1400MHz).
now the other problem comes into my mind, should i change the motherboard or to get an extra 1GB ram? which is the better option?coz the 2 upgrade option is almost the same price in my country here.
should i get a good overclocking motherboard, and then later maybe few months add another 1GB ram(when the prices of RAM drop). or just go ahead with 1GB ram.


**currently im using 2 X 256MB kingston DDR400, and the mobo's integrated video card.

 

[clue69less]

i own a pathetic MSI K8MM-V mobo plus sempron 2500++ palermo processor, why i call the mobo pathetic is that it didn overclock AT ALL. no option in bios to do so either,and when im trying to overclock in windows using clockGen, even a slight 50MHz increase in FSB will crash the whole system.
sempron processors particularly the new palermo core overclock very well, so the cpu isn't the problem that holding me from overclocking. the problem lies on the mobo.
therefore, i decided to change only the motherboard, so that i can overclock it to maybe 300FSB which is equal to 1200MHz of hypertransport and 2100MHz cpu speed(from the original 1400MHz).
now the other problem comes into my mind, should i change the motherboard or to get an extra 1GB ram? which is the better option?coz the 2 upgrade option is almost the same price in my country here.
should i get a good overclocking motherboard, and then later maybe few months add another 1GB ram(when the prices of RAM drop). or just go ahead with 1GB ram.


**currently im using 2 X 256MB kingston DDR400, and the mobo's integrated video card.

I don't know that mobo. I don't suppose there is a bios update for it?

 

[edwuave]

ya, the latest bios dont have any changes other than some new cpuid only.

 

[hashv2f16]

hmmm... and is this a brand name computer? (e.g. dell or other crap like that).

cos these companies make ther boards especially not to overclock.

 

[hashv2f16]

"should i change the motherboard or to get an extra 1GB ram?"

so i take it you already have 1gb of ram? you will only need 2GB of ram if you are doing a whole bunch of demanding applications at one time (e.g playing bf2 while burning dvds or while encoding video in photoshop)

is this an XP generation or A64 sempron chip? (e.g s462/s754 board?)

another option (probably overall a better idea) would be if you could save the money i would advise you sell your current mobo and cpu and buy a 3000+ venice on a very nice but cheap board such as the asus A8N-E, like i have. it overclocks nicely on good cooling.

but i guess you want to keep your CPU right?

What i would do:

1. buy another 1gb (get 2x1GB) for now......
2. [and later on:] get a s939 mobo with an a64 chip, then you can re-use the memory

 

[xrodney]

1GB is now minimum to play newest games and in my case I got big improvment on overal performance with 2GB.
In some cases even now i get oom and have about 3GB swap file (sw creators are sometimes crazy).
So for normal use 1GB is enough, but if you want to play newest games on high resolution go for more.