Should I get a new processor or more ram, or both?

Question

I'm a college student, on a budget. I have a pentium something 1.4ghz, and a 512 ram and a 256 ram chip in it already, but my laptop is agonizingly slow. Manufacturer says I can go up to 1ghz ram chips. Will that make it work better? I don't know squat about computers.

Answer 1

If you're running XP, that should be plenty. Just make sure you've installed good virus and spy-ware programs (usually free from the ISP).

Also, stop the zillions of programs from starting automatically. THey all take up memory & processing time. Also, go into IE advanced setup and have it empty the temp files when IE closed. For that matter, set the temp files to only like 90mb.

These are just good houskeeping tips no matter how fast you pc.

Answer 2

It is very simple.
The processor is measured in GHz (or MHz for lower processors) for example you have 1.4 GHz which is about 1400 MHz.
The processor, his name says it, it PROCESSES the information. (ex. You push a letter on a keyboard, it processes it, then makes the monitor display it.)
If you upgrade your processor, then it won't be really faster, it'll only be a matter of seconds (unless you do really big games)
Second, the RAM is the "temporary" storage for all the applications you are running.
I would say get better RAM.
512 nowadays isn't enough, you should upgrade to 1GB (buy 1 512MB so 512+512=1024=1GB)

Go to http://www.crucial.com, enter your computer model and brand, and it tells you what RAM to get (you can even order from there).

If you want to get a new processor, then think about getting a new motherboard, graphics card, sound card, hard drive, and maybe power supply. (Unless you find the match where everything is compatible)

Answer 3

Have at least 1 gig of ram, the extra ram will certainly help.