Which makes an overall difference when you upgrade your computer ram or a new cpu?

Question

I just want to know because i want to upgrade a computer if you need me to become specific ask.

Which would be better for internet browsing and videos on youtube.

Answer 1

I agree with the other answers, RAM is the best value to improve overall performance. The surest way to make sure your new RAM will work in your system is to take a stick with you when you buy it, but if you want to order it, it's best to have the manufactures name and model number of the mother board to match it up with.
For a home system used for the Internet and multi-media, 1 GB will work just fine.

Keeping the hard drive cleaned up, especially temporary Internet files, and defragmented once a month will also speed things up. Remember, it's the slowest part of the system.

Reducing the number of programs that start when you boot up also makes a significant difference. All those icons in the system tray(by the clock) are using memory and processor time so, decide if you really need them just sitting there and waiting using up resources.

To improve movie viewing like from utube, make sure your firewall and virus scan settings have the website on the safe list or exclude them from scanning.

Just so you know, I have a 400MHz Celeron with 576Mb RAM running Windows 2000 Server using a cable high speed connection and have no lapses or skips with movies or streaming video. It's all in how you tune the system, the CPU spends most of it's time waiting as it is.

Answer 2

RAM is the easiest upgrade and gives you the best performance for your money. If you don't want to buy a whole new machine, max out the system's memory first. It'll give you quite a performance boost.

If you really need to upgrade the CPU, you might as well think about replacing the entire computer. A faster CPU usually means a new motherboard. A new motherboard usually means it can support faster memory. However, a fast CPU and fast RAM means nothing if you don't have a good video card - and at that point, you're about $200 away from a whole new machine (case, power supply, hard drive, dvd-drive...)

Answer 3

Your specific requirement does not need a fast cpu. You are better off with a RAM upgrade. 2x512mb is great for XP and 2x1Gb for Vista (preferably in dual channel mode).

Answer 4

They both make an overall difference. cpu is more expensive though. more specific would help.

If you wanna run more things at once, faster, than go for cpu

Answer 5

ram is for speed cpu is not