Hardware for Wrath

[Concillian]

This is something I am very concerned about, and I will have a rough time justifying the expense of a new machine. I'm not sure there are any pieces I can feasibly upgrade though that will make much difference.

I have an AMD Mobile Barton 2500+, o/c to 2.2GHz from 1.85.

If I upgrade mobo/CPU I would need a new card (I have a 7600GT which is AGP not PCI-E). There isn't much more video cardwise I can do with AGP I believe.

I could add more memory if I could find some old enough. I don't know if that will provide much benefit (I have 1G now).

This is all complicated by the fact that I do not have a Windows license, and I'm sure my performance in Wine is not as good as the same hardware would be in Windows.

There are actually ATi3800 series AGP cards, which are a large improvement over a 7600GT (and ATi linux drivers are much better than they used to be), so AGP isn't dead, dead. However, the major gap in your system is the AthlonXP, and that does nothing to address your major issue.

Memory helps flight paths and loading, but not so much once you get into instances. Some disc thrashing is reduced, but I don't think it's major. Again, the A-XP is your sticking point. Other improvments will be minor in comparison. Add in that 1GB of DDR is about the same cost of 2GB of DDR2 and it's really hard to justify spending money on DDR at this point.

In your case, as you noted, it's hard to upgrade anything without upgrading everything. The cheap option of e4850 + 780G + 2 gig + $50 video card is less than $200 and offers significant improvements in all areas. I expect will be adequate even with the WINE tax on performance, certainly better than your current machine in TBC. If you have access to a heatsink that fits the AM2 socket, you can shave $10-15 bucks of the processor and get an OEM 2.3GHz dual core, but I think there's value in the e4850 which will use less power but runs faster, so that you essentially make back that $10-15 over time in the reduced power usage, and get an extra 200 MHz as a bonus for taking the retail package with heatsink. You can shave maybe $10 off by going with a 740G mobo, but they're kind of a kludge between previous gen with certain options only enabled if you use a Phenom (AMD quad-core) and disabled with a dual core, it's an odd duck that I tend to avoid, but it is an option for a small savings.

One problem really old systems like yours might have is too many IDE drives, since modern mobos only include one header (2 IDE drives max).

$200 is $200 but I don't see a move to PCIe ever getting much cheaper. DDR3 is the new memory standard & DDR2 is saturated in the channel (sorry, I realized this is industry-speak that people may not understand, translation: there is too much DDR2 right now, prices are essentially below market value). Prices are probably close to bottomed out on RAM right now. It will probably be at least a year before DDR3 gets to this kind of price point, and as DDR2 stockpiles diminish, those prices will stabilize and start increasing. Mobo + processor has never been much cheaper than $120. And decent video cards have never been in the $50 range. I don't expect a transition to PCIe to be much cheaper than this for a good long time. At the same time you end up with a dual-core and at least twice the RAM. 4x RAM if you pony up an extra $20-25.

And you have an upgrade path with triple core Phenoms in the $100 range and quads in the $140 in case triples / quads start being more useful than they are now. The bad news is AMD has their next processor introduction set for January, which will obsolete the AM2 platform. But this will also be DDR3, and thus likely not a reasonable option for budget purchase for at least a year. The good thing about a platform that's about to be replaced is it's pretty cheap to get into. And when you're someone who buys parts on the trailing edge to save cash, it's actually quite a good thing.