New Hi, everyone I'm glad I found this site. I've purchase my first computer two months ago. It a hp compaq presario it has 17 inch crt monitor. I have about 256 mb inside it. I like my computer but I also like to update it any suggestion on what I can have done to it. I know I like to have a dvd burner add right now it has a cd burner/dvd rom can I add the dvd burner and still keep my cd burner.
could you be a little more specific about yout specs, what motherboard is in there?, what processor do you have?, what type of 256mb ram do you have? (eg pc3200 ddr400), and what graphics card do you have, is it agp, or pci? AND whay power suply do you have, wattage is'nt everything, what brand is your power supply?, if you still cant find what brand oyur power supply and motherboard is, open up your case, and look at the power supply, there should be a label on it that tells you everyhting about it, and usually somwere inbetween the ram slots and the northbridge heatsing is the name/manufacturer/.REV or the motherboard. there is some programs that can help you find all this information out like sisoftware sandra (i think thats what its called) and there is everest home edition, and you can get an evaluation copy of everst ultimate.
If you want to find out information about your system then try PC Wizard 2005 it wont tell you things like the Power Supply manufacturer (you'll have to look inside for that) but it can tell you information about your motherboard, CPU, RAM, Graphics Card, Sound Card (if applicable) to add another drive is fairly simple but you may need a bigger PSU as ones that ship with PC's aren't usually up-to-scratch (unless its custom built with a decent PSU or is performance PC in which case it is vital) EDIT: this thread needs to be moved to the right section...just realised.
Besides giving the specs (a model number of the machine would work well too), could you give a feel as to what you want to do with this machine and what kinda budget you're looking at?
The model number is SR1403WM-B I have 256 mb DDR-SDRAM I'm willing to spend 400 hundreds dollars more to update it.
For $51 you can get the Pioneer DVR-109 BK. Newegg is a great on-line store, and is recommended (I've spent at least $1K there). While this isn't a power system, I'd bump up the RAM. At just under $45, this Kingston ValueRAM (PC3200--DDR400, 512MB) would help you in the performance department. If you're interested in gaming some, $80 can snag you a Sapphire brand Radeon 9600 Pro with 256MB of it's own RAM. That's just some of what you could do. I saw you've got USB speakers, and wasn't sure if those were up to snuff for what you're doing or not. You could bump up the sound with a sound card and 4.1 speakers for under $100. I'd link some more, but it appears that Newegg is doing some updating to their site right now.
If you're interested in some very immersive sound I wouldn't look any further than these: Sound Card http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16829120103 5.1 Speakers http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16836121118 For the video card get one of these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814150106 It will give you some very solid performance in all you're games and won't break the bank either.
If you go with a GeForce 6600 or higher or Radeon X700 or higher, you will need to get a better power supply. Something like the Fortron Blue Storm 500 or Enermax EG565P-VE are around $80-85 or so.
In my opinion just get the Thermaltake Smart PurePower 420wt psu off newegg. It has support for PCI Express too (got it today)
