How much does it really help

Hey guys. I was starting to think about getting into overclocking my cpu/video card. But I had a general question.

How much does overclocking actually help increase the performance of a card/cpu?

For example:

I have 1GB of DDR ram, an Athlon 64+ 3500+, and an Nvidia Geforce 6800, windows xp. I know this is an old system (actually only 4 years), which is why I am starting to think about overclocking, if I break this comp then I wont feel so bad.

My question is this:

If I overclocked my cpu and/or graphics card to a reasonable and stable amount, would I be able to play games on high settings that I could previously only play on medium settings before overclocking?

Such as:

I can currently play The Witcher on Medium settings w/o overclocking. Could I play on High if I overclocked?

I can currently play Bioshock on low settings. Could I play on Medium if I overclocked?

I can currently play Medieval War 2: Total War on Medium settings. Could I play on High settings if I overclocked?

etc...




When I say "play" I mean at decent frame rates, and I'm not too picky, so around 15-20fps.


Thanks for the info guys

Medium settings on those games maybe just good on 1GB RAM, on high settings i would consider more RAM.

For ex. at medium settings, games need 400MB RAM while at high settings is 600MB, if your RAM has enough space (no other RAM eater apps), the games will run just fine, but if it's not enough, your CPU and HDD will work twice harder because it have to move all other apps from RAM into swap, while loading files of games. A process of making space aren't fast because HDD are slow, so it affecting your Games, and there it is the hiccups/ low fps happen.

As cnumartyr said, you can give it a try on OCing, but if you want a maximum result, considering more RAM is good too...