I Want to Speed Up My PC. (Besides a CPU Upgrade) What's Best: More Memory, Faster Drive, Or Better

It really depends on both the current specs of your PC and the workload you are running Memory is one of those things you either have enough of or you do not . If you do not have enough things will be slow as hell due to the swapping but if you have more than enough it will only make a marginal difference over having enough. What enough is varies but for most people 2GB is probablly eonugh and 4GB is more than enough (also note as others have mentioned if you are running a 32-bit OS you are limited to 4GB of address space which usually means 3. GB of ram since other stuff (particually graphics cards) takes up address space. Drives can make a lot of difference to responsiveness but ordinary modern desktop drives are 7200 RPM and even say a velociraptor is only 10000 RPM so there is not that much to gain with rotating drives. If you really want good drive performance get a SSD. Video cards make a big difference to games but do not really impact anything else, if you have problems when you turn up the graphics settings in your games this is where you should look to upgrade. Be aware that 1GB video cards (or 512MB cards in SLI) may not be a very smart idea if you are running a 32-bit OS due to the address space lost (if you use a 1GB video card in a 32-bit system you will probablly end up with less than 3GB of usable ram)

1. Will a better Video card speed up your cpu?

Certainly yes good vga card do increase the whole performance of you PC

2. GeForce 7300 GT 256 MB PCI-E or the ATI X1300 PRO... which one is the better video card?

If you are running Vista I suggest a 7600GT it's alot more about 170 online. But between those two the ATi is gonna be a slight better. You should check online and see reviews, and see online at the stats.

3. whats a better video card than my built in ati radeon hd4200?

Other than ATI Radeon graphic cards, Nvidia ones are the best for gaming purpose. I have a Nvidia Geforce 8800GTS 512 MB one and an ATI Radeon 512 MB one. Comparing these two things, Nvidia is better.

4. Radeon 6970 any better video card?

At that cost get a GTX 680!

5. Should i get a better video card or increase the ram?

Why not do both? Typically, a couple of gigs of RAM do not cost much more than $40. You can then spend about $50 or so on a decent (but not great) video card and have the entire thing upgraded for less than $100

6. How do I get a better video card to play the sims 3?

Yes, you are going to have a buy a new video card. A good one will run you $100-$300, and you wo not have to replace it for a few years

7. Whats a better video card for the $$$?

Use nVidia is good enough if you are not gaming in it. If you want better performance get Radeon 2600XT. nVidia is focus in newer technology such as PCI-E so it has better parts in it.

8. Will a better video card help with editing pictures?

no it wond do anything for ur pics! srry but ive tryed

9. Is it more ram i need or a better video card?

Probably more RAM, because you have a pretty good Video Card Go to Crucial.com or Newegg.com for RAM

10. What would be the downsides of switching out my laptop motherboard to get a better video card? Data loss, etc?

Laptop motherboards are generally designed for that particular model, and are not interchangeable. The data lives on the drive. XP and higher, however, does NOT like a motherboard switched out from under it: you will need to rescue your data, format the drive, then copy it back. Have you tried the defragging, cleaning up the drive, checking for spyware, etc?

11. which is a better video card for gaming over all? X1950 pro or the 8600GT?

defo the 8600GT i own one and am very pleased, ur other specs are better than mine aswell but i still manage to play the orange box