RAM upgrade worth it?

[Mandarinsidekick]

Hello forum,

I currently have this laptop: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&objectID=c00586930

Would upgrading the 512MB of DDR333 memory to 2GB be worth it for ~$120CAD? I am trying to avoid having to buy a new laptop to last a few more years, so if a memory upgrade will help that would be great. It's mainly an internet/office box, but multi-tasking is important and there is the occasional enormous spreadsheet or model software to run (I'm a civil engineer).

On that note...how much more performance would I get from a low end dual core processor, such as the T3400? There are some good looking Lenovos out there.

Thank you for any and all feedback.

 

[math1337]

512 mb is not sufficient even for web browsing. upgrading the ram would be a very good choice.

 

[captaincharisma]

if you are still running XP on that laptop than 2GB would be a waste because there is no real speed increase with XP over 1GB. maybe if you can see if you can just upgrade to 1GB of ram.

you will only notice a small improvement though because your CPU is only 1.8GHZ

 

[Mandarinsidekick]

Thank you for the feedback. I will just grab a 1GB stick to pump some extra life into it.