hey,
i am here to ask advice not to get my ocurse work done for me, i am wokring on the current assignment below and currently dont even know where to start, i am prob the weakest member of the IT group but i want to get better.

this is the assignment that we got and it is about upgrading comptuers. the BREIF lists various parts but i dont really know what the specifacations of the parts mean, thus i dont know how good they are or where to even start with an upgrade as i dont really know also what i should be upgradeing to. (yeah i know i should know this stuff ifi am taking an IT practitioners,), i was googleing the parts, but it is not really helping as all i am fining is the parts and their prices , and their specifacation, but this is getting me no further with figureing out what to upgrade to.

i was considering just saying to do ram upgrades and hardrive upgrades but... yeah i am at a loss,

any ideas?

Task 2 - Recommending an upgrade (D2)
The machine which is currently used to demonstrate products does the job by showing
PowerPoint presentations which are made up of text and graphics. It is fairly out of date
but could easily be useful in another role. This is the specification:
● Pentium 4 1.4 GHz processor
● 128MB RAM
● Asus P4P8X SE motherboard
● IBM Fireball Plus 15GB hard drive
4 of 6
● floppy drive
● ATi Rage Pro 2x AGP graphics card (4MB)
● ATX mini tower case with 300 watt PSU
● Unbranded DVD-ROM drive
● standard PS/2 mouse and keyboard
● 17” AOC CRT monitor
● Windows XP Professional
● PowerPoint 97
The client wants to take it home for his 15 year old son to use as a gaming and Internet
machine as well as the odd bit of homework (LOL). Obviously it is not up to the job so
what upgrades would he need? He is not keen to spend more than £150.
List at least three hardware upgrades and three software upgrades. Be precise and
specific about the new parts and software (e.g. if you recommend a new mouse then say
which manufacturer and model).
The key thing is to end up with a machine that is suitable for the job.

thank you for your time , Old system; I wouldnt invest in adding anything to what you have.Would be helpful to know what games the son is INTERESTED in. For homework, the computer would be useful as is.

I fully understand xavier's OPINION. If high-end gaming is the objective, then upgrading this machine PROBABLY not a practical idea. But, if decision is to proceed with this, I think the processor, RAM, and video card are the three most critical updates. But, keep in mind a possible need to upgrade the power supply if other components are upgraded.

I see the motherboard supports AGP 8x, so I'd get a card with at least 256MB of memory; 512 or more would be better. I don't want to get into specific cards.

RAM should be increased to at least 512MB. I'm not a gamer, but more than 512MB would probably be the way to go, if possible. Have you determined how much the motherboard will support?

Have you determined what range of processors the motherboard will support? I think you need to provide some of this basic info here. That video card won't run any modern games. A new card with 256 MB will be in the US $40 to $50 range. 1 GB of ram will also be in that price range. Beyond that, I wouldn't put any more money into that machine.

128 MB of ram with XP must be painfully slow.I would advise using the old computer as a door stop.

Im surprised the graphics card even has the nerve to put anything on the monitor!

Then advise that they stop being stindgy with their money and go and buy a modern pc!!

The old pc would do as a general office pc for typing documents and general web surfing. I agree that by updating the graphics card, hdd and memory you might get a bit more life out of it on a basic level, maybe even a more powerful psu. But other than that its a complete upgrade. i.e new pc.Do the math>memory> v card> GOOD power supply = appx. $190.00