I just recently upgraded my videocard to a ATI 4670 and it really led me deeper into my system.

I was just finding out some info about my motherboard and was wondering how much more bang I can really get outta this board.


I have 2gb ram, Pentium 4 HT 3.06 Ghz processor, 450w PSU.

Following are the specifications for the Microstar MS-7248 motherboard.

Feature Specification
Form Factor
Micro BTX
Dimensions: 10.5 × 10.4 inches
CPU Support
Package: LGA775
System Bus Support: 800/533 MHz
Memory Support
Two DDR2 DIMM slots
1.8 V (only) DDR2 SDRAM Dual Inline Memory Modules (DIMMs) with gold-plated contacts
Unbuffered, single-sided or double-sided DIMMs
Note: Single sided ×16 modules are supported but double-sided ×16 modules are not.

Non-ECC DIMMs
Serial Presence Detect
DDR2 533 or DDR2 400 MHz SDRAM DIMMs
Maximum total system memory: 2 GB
Minimum total system memory: 128 MB
MCH (Northbridge) ATI RC410 Rev. A12
ICH (Southbridge) ATI SB450 Rev. A13
Firmware Hub 4 MB LPC Flash ROM
Integrated LAN Integrated 10/100 LAN Realtek RT8100C co-layout GiGi RTL8110S
Integrated Audio
Interface: Azalia 8.1 channels
Model: Realtek ALC861
IEEE 1394a Controller VIA VT6307
Serial Input/Output (SIO) Winbond 83627 EHF
Add-in Card Slots
One PCI Express ×16 (graphics interface)
One PCI Express ×1
Two PCI conventional
Rear panel I/O Ports
Four USB 2.0 ports
Two PS/2 (keyboard/mouse) ports
One parallel port
One VGA monitor port
One RJ-45 LAN port
Six Analog audio jacks
Internal Headers
Two 2-port USB 2.0 headers (2 × 5)
Front panel audio header (2 × 5, mic / headphone)
Front panel header (2 × 5)
IEEE 1394a front panel header
Chassis power LED header (1 × 3)
Floppy disk drive connector
Primary IDE connector
Secondary IDE connector
Four Serial ATA connectors
Two ATAPI headers
Clear CMOS jumper
Main Power Connector 24-pin (2 × 12)
Auxiliary 12V CPU power connector 4-pin (2 × 2)
CPU Fan connector
Rear fan connector

All of that can be found here http://support.gateway.com/s/MOTHE [...] sp2.shtml#

Should I invest in a new motherboard? Have I got all i can get outta this one? What about a processor upgrade?

I have the exact same computer. I have made some upgrades like an ATI radeon HD 4650 1GB Video Card, a 1TB hard drive, and a blu-ray player. Saddly, thats about all we are going to get out of this machine. Even if we put in better memory stix, it looks like its not going to performe much better. We juts need to face the music and build or buys ower selves a better computer. But if your only using your computer for the internet or for watching movies and simple gaming and not for multi-tasking that it works fine. I personally like doing a lot of work on my computer and I just slowed it down with all the programs I tried to run all at once. It's hard for me to wait for a computer to do a simple job, thats why I upgraded the hard drive because I destroyed the old 200gb hard drive with too many downloads and movies. The new hard drive helped with the speed but when it comes to multi-tasking I'm just going to have to build a new one. The good thing is that I am half way there. Newegg has been very helpful and so has Toms hardware and cnet. Good luck with the computer, let me know what's going on with it and maybe we can help each other out.