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Ok so, I have a Dell Dimension 8400. It has 3.0 Ghz Processor, 1 gig of Ram (2 X 512mb) and I just got a Geforce 7950 512 MB video Card.

My question is my motherboard is upgradeable to 4 gigs of ram. There are four slots and each slot holds up to one gig. Newegg is selling a 2 gig (1 gig X 2) ram pack for $109.00...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820145527

...should I buy one pack or two packs? Will the four gigs be a noticeable difference over the 2? My buddy tells me I will see a nice difference from 1 gig to 2 gigs but little difference from 2 gigs to 4 gigs. I'd like to save the extra $109 but if it’s a big difference between 2 and 4 than I'll spring for it.

And I will not be upgrading to vista any time soon.

You wont notice a difference unless you mount a ram drive and install wow to it.

There's no reason you can't run 3GB. Use the 2 512's you already have and then the 2 1GB slots, just alternate them on your mobo.

1GB is plenty for WoW anyways, you won't notice much difference from 1-2 in WoW.

I still get video lag in shattrath. It's annoying. Is there anything else I can do? I run defrag like once a week. Anything like that?

Don't know man. My computer isn't as fast as yours and I don't lag there. Maybe try reinstalling.

Are your settings turned on high?

everything is on max, yeah

Do you have any mods? I have titan panel but the only thing I have turned on are the loc coordinates.

try deleting your UI and getting the latest version of it. I've had my cosmos lag me so bad I couldnt move in shatt.

Ginz, go with 2 Gigs for your system via 2 chips. No more, no less.

Tacks wrote:1GB is plenty for WoW anyways, you won't notice much difference from 1-2 in WoW.

This is true with a 19" monitor running 1280x1024 or less.

For my 30" Monitor or 42" TV with 1920x1200 and sometimes higher, 2 Gig runs a lot smoother everywhere.

Yeah I have a 20" widescreen and I am running at 1440X900.

I'll bump it up to 2 gigs.

lyion wrote:
This is true with a 19" monitor running 1280x1024 or less.

/shrug I'm not running 19" monitor at 1280x1024 or less, I guess i'm amazing

I really only lag in shat. I don't know what it is. Maybe I should try reinstalling.

I dread that though.

QoS packet scheduler on? if it is KILL IT

I don't even know what that is. How would I check? Add/Remove programs?

I'm a little computer stupid.

Start
Run
Type - services.msc
Find the QOS service, and change it to disabled.

Sweet. Thanks, I'll do it when I go home for lunch.

Someone had a good point, if you're running tons of bulky mods that will eat up RAM. I try to be a purist and use the least amount of mods as possible.

On the services thing: Turn off the QOS service, fine, but unless you know exactly what you're doing, don't touch any other service while you're in there, you can completely fuck your PC if you disable something critical.

-Arlos

Someone had a good point, if you're running tons of bulky mods that will eat up RAM. I try to be a purist and use the least amount of mods as possible.

The only thing I ever use is LOC. So I have the newest version of titan panel and the only thing I have turned on in my ad ons menu is coordinates. I suppose I can find a coordinates only mod out there, it might be a lot less cumbersome than titan panel.

Tacks wrote:

lyion wrote:
This is true with a 19" monitor running 1280x1024 or less.

/shrug I'm not running 19" monitor at 1280x1024 or less, I guess i'm amazing

YMMV.

I've played WOW with a 6800 GT, 7900 GS, and an 8800 GTX, as well as one and two gigs of RAM. The extra RAM seemed to help the higher resolutions more than the video cards in my benchmarking.

I ran a handful of mods, though, which may have contributed.

From a PC gaming performance standpoint, 2x1 gigs of RAM is the best way to go.

I have a pretty lousy computer and it runs the game great. I had CT on for raid, but it lagged me greatly in Shat. I took that beast off and I have no lag. If I do have any lag in there it is because people are crowded around in certain places. I can turn a circle in there so, I guess, the computer...does something, I dont know, and I have minimal lag.

I have a pretty lousy computer and it runs the game great.

Wow, you must have a lucky computer or something

Unless you are running a 64 bit version of Windows XP or Windows Vista (any flavor), your computer wont see all of the 4Gb anyways.

WinXP Pro 32 Bit will see about 3.3-3.5 of the memory, and really only make use of about 3Gb of it. So save some cash, and just get a single 2Gb Kit, and run them in conjunction with the 1Gb you already have.


Also, if memory serves, the 8400 Dimension was running a 925 Intel chipset, which sucks, because if it was at least the 945, could have upgraded to perhaps a dual core to squeeze a bit more life out of the machine.

Yeah that's correct, the 925 according to my service tag lookup.

And the lag really isn't as bad as I make it out to be. I get like 50-75 FPS everywhere but shattrath and there I get 30-50 and every once in awhile it will skip when I am turning. Hopefully the extra ram will remedy that annoyance.

Thanks for all the feedback guys.