Another stupid question

Hello guys, I have a laptop (ACER) that has 512 ram and 1.8Ghz and as with most acers SiS graphic adjustable to 128mb of shared video memory. I had a test that shown (after all regular applications are up) my computer to have only 150mb of ram left while on 128mb video mem. Question is: If I upgrade ram to 1gig or more, will my games or 3D rendering software run smoother? For example(theoretical) If I upgraded the ram to lets say 1512ish...subtract the ram used while all regular apps. are up, will the ram left over from the video distribution affect how a game runs?

 

I think you'd get better performance in non-graphical applications. Or, should I just say, I dont think you'd notice a big increase in graphical performance. You would however, notice a big improvement in running a graphical application while running other apps though (after all, thats what RAM usually improves).

So basically, I'm saying I dont think you'd notice a difference because your graphics programs are utilizing memory more effectively, I'm saying you'd probably notice a difference, but it would be just because added memory lets you multi-task better.

 

Your games are pretty much entirely GPU-limited. Adding RAM might give a minor boost, but honestly, that SiS part is wretched.

 

thnx guys for the info

 

Would upgrading the processor to 2.70 ghz help..?

 

Not really. As I said before, your games are GPU limited, limited by the SiS part itself. You could drop a hypothetical 5 GHz processor in there and you'd see a minimal performance improvement at best.

 

Agreed. It doesn't matter what kind of parts you put in there - the SiS chip will be the bottleneck every time.

It isn't meant for gaming - I'd be careful if you are playing games, it could overheat.

 

Thats what I was TRYING to say!

I think it came out a little complicated though.

 

**** SiS...Just good enough for typing then...Should of done more research before I bought to piece of crap.

 

We all make mistakes.

My first laptop, I was hellbent on having dedicated video memory.

So I bought a Toshiba with a dedicated GPU.

An S3 dedicated GPU.

Intel Extreme Graphics is faster than that piece of crap. It ran Unreal Tournament 1999 at native and that's about it, and it was buggy as hell.

Then my second laptop, even though I swore I wanted a good dedicated GPU (at least a Mobility Radeon 9200 at the time), I wound up getting a different one with IEG2 because my then-girlfriend liked it better. UGH.

At least I got it right on the third try.

 

Same here!

I had a Dell Inspiron 5000 once, with an 8MB dedicated Rage Mobility 128. Woah! Fast!

I hated the 3D performance...worse than integrated. So, I bought an HP zv5000z. But, I didn't realize how bad the card really was - a GF4 440 GO 64M. No pixel shaders, DX7!!

So, I told myself I would never buy a laptop with an aging GPU again - and the next one would have pixel shaders!! I really missed those!!

So, figured it out this time, X700 does what ever I want it to do.

 

So whats in a laptop that makes it a good "gaming" laptop?...can you guys give me spec ideas; ram, GHz, processor, etc.

 

The GPU is pretty much key, with RAM and processor a healthy second. I go through both in the articles in my sig.