Upgrade RAM for gaming on older notebook?

I have a Dell Inspiron 9200 notebook with 1GB of RAM. It's definately lagging... even in older games (e.g., City of Villains). While I really want to upgrade, some have suggested that I hold off until the next generation of of CPUs and high-end GPUs hit the market.

So here are my questions: (1) Will upgrading to 2GB of RAM help me squeeze another 4-5 months of gaming out of this machine?; and (2) What kind of in-game or other tests can I do to figure this out? I mostly play MMORPGs (like World of Warcraft, City of Heroes, etc).

My current notebook configuration is:

1. ATI Mobility Radeon 9700 GPU,
2. 2.00 GHz Pentium M,
3. 1 GB RAM,
4. 7200RPM Hard Disk (not sure the manufacturer).

My goal is to spend as little as possible so that I can drop a nice chunk of change on a new laptop sometime before the end of the calendar year. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

-M

 

It's hard to say, for gaming, definitely the graphics card is the main part - RAM helps, but not as much as a better graphics card.

Considering the price of RAM nowadays, 2gb isn't expensive and should be worth it whether or not you will continue to game.