thanks for the help guys. the guy im about to move in with is pretty smart with computers, so i think we're gonna split one.

i think amd is the kind my friend at work was telling me about.

 

I used to be a big AMD fan, but I've gone back to the pentium bandwagon.

 

I can't stand AMD... too many compatability problems... friend that works for an online retailer says they regularly have returns for AMD cpus and boards because they don't work with everything like Intel does.

Intel returns are less than 1%.... AMD returns are well over 30%.

 

i like my AMD...its 4 years old and no problems yet - even with new hardware!

celeron processes are recycled processors....think about that.

 

1. Make sure that you don't have any spyware or virus stuff on the computer. That stuff, especially the spyware, can bring your system to a crawl.

2. 128MB of RAM is the bare minimum. Knock it up to 256 or more, and I think the computer will really wake up.

3. After doing 1 & 2 above, if it still feels slow, you can use MSConfig to stop loading unneeded services and programs, and change your display settings to disable the fancy animation effects.

A 1.1GHz CPU is more than adequate for running XP. And unless you're compiling large programs or rendering images all day, it's adequate for your applications too.

You have barely enough RAM to load Windows, which leaves nothing for your applications. That means that Windows has to use your disk to supplement the RAM, and the disk is a thousand times slower than RAM. That can really slow things down!

 

XP chokes on 256. Upgrade to 512 & be happy

 

damn i don't even have 256! what are all of the fany animation things i need to turn off?

 

Right-click on your desktop, select properties & go to appearance.

Now, change from WindowsXP to Windows Classic. Go into 'effects' and turn off transition effects, shadowing & smoothing. Actually, fawk all that stuff, it's bloated.

That'll help a bit, I'll check this thread from home & update too. In the meantime, go to www.tweakxp.com

 

Yea. there's stuff there that makes it pretty... but will slow it down.

 

I've just built 3 computers in the last week. Just wait for the computer components to go on sale. I don't know if you guys have a "Fry's Electronics" where u live but try them. They sell cheap stuff. By cheap, I mean cheap pricewise, and quality. You gotta watch out what u buy though. I bought some ECS (I know they're crappy) motherboard/CPU combos for around $100.

Here's what I got in all:
2 ECS K7S5A boards w/ AMD 2100+ processors = $110 each
1 intel board w/ P4 2.4GHZ = $170 (GOOD DEAL)
40GB Maxtor HD = $50 each
bought 6 Kingston 512mb sticks (PC2700 DDR)= $40 each (supercheap)

Don't know why I'm listing all this, but it gives u an idea of what you can upgrade to. My recommendation is that you dump the celeron processor. They're crap. I think the front side bus only runs at 75MHz. Dont quote me though. I've had good experiences w/ both AMD thoroughbred and Pentium 4 processors. I prefer Pentium though.