Old games and old computer

[pmalone]

I am trying to upgrade my son's old computer. It is an old Pentium III, 996 mHZ, 512 mb RAM. He wants to be able to play games like Morrowind and Fusion Falls. His computer will barely run Morrowind, but it won't run Fusion Falls at all. He does have a decent graphics card that we bought a couple of months ago so I am guessing that the old motherboard is the culprit. The game will run on a 1.9 ghz computer, so I am guessing a 2+ will more than do the job. I haven't done a motherboard upgrade before. Does anyone have any suggestions about what kind of brands or options to look at?

Thanks!

 

[Dnhilos]

What would be your budget?
I recently upgraded my friends computer for 300 bucks and its able to run games like dragon age with ease.
What kind of graphics card is it? VGA?

Also,
are you planning on keeping any components?

 

[JDFan]

Thing is a P3 is going to be hard to find so you'll also need to upgrade other parts than the MOBO and CPU -- what Video card did you buy and is it PCI, AGP, or PCI-e ?
chances are it also will not be able to be reused on a newer system (PCI and AGP are pretty much outdated and getting a new MOBO that supports them is going to really limit the upgrade and also cost more than just starting over (older parts get more expensive as there is a limited number of options available.)

IF you let us know what type of budget overall you will have and a bit of a detailed list of the parts you currently have we can put some suggestions together. ( ie. chances are you might be able to reuse the Mouse\keyboard, DVD drive,Monitor, possibly the HDD if it is worth it (a new 500GB. drive runs about $40 and is much faster than the old 120-160GB. drives), Case and Powersupply might be reuseable but Powersupply is probably under powered for what would be needed for gaming so might need replacing depending on the type of case you have. other than that the rest of the parts will probably need to be replaced -- PIII CPUs just are not good for games like morrowind etc. and the 1.9Ghz. spec is probably based on a PIV CPU not PIII ! --

Fortunately pricing has really come down so it is a good time for upgrading but we'd need to know a budget to suggest the best options at that price point. Another thing is do you have the windows installation disks from the old system or will you need a new copy of windows as that will add to the overall cost and needs to be considered.

 

[linuxhero27]

Go on Newegg and check out their DIY PC Combos (http://www.newegg.com/Store/MasterComboStore.aspx?StoreID=7&name=DIY-PC-Combos). I can almost guarantee that even the Sub-$200 combos will run those games, and run quite well.

Step 1 - Buy these two (Approx. $200)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboBundleDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.575619
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814187114

Step 2 - Install in case and recycle the old system.

Step 3 - Set your OS up to play Morrowind and Fusion Falls.

Step 4 - Have fun slaying Dagoth!