revive older PC

My older PC a Hp pavilion a1203w, bought in 2005. Originally came with SIS 760 integrated graphics card. 40 GB IDE HD and only 512MB of ram.
Upgrades I have done to the A1203w.
(1) upgraded to AGP graphics card two years ago (BFG 6200oc-(factory oc)-256 MB.
(2) 1 80gb IDE HD
(3) 1 60gb SATA HD (a friend gave to me-just had to by a adapter for the power cable.)
The original 40gb HD is put away for later usage if needed.
I plan to upgrade the Ram to 2 gigs later. (Max my mother board will accept.)

With Win7 on the 40gb HD, (I put it there first because I did not know I my PC would run Win7 at first), it performed great. I soon got the 80gb HD-then the 160gb HD.

I put Fresh install on Win7 on the 160 (Seagate barracuda), and Win7 with BFG6200 and only 512mb ram performs flawlessly. Too me it out performs XP in every way, from start up to shutdown (if I even shut it down). I usually leave it on 24/7. On the original 40gb HD is was a little sluggish. I think that was my own doing. To much tinkering.

So far no tinkering with Win7 on the 160gb HD as is runs great. I should leave well enough alone and not mess with Win7. I just like to see what is behind the curtains. That is how I learned the ins and outs of XP. Which is in-itself is/was a great OS (but thats for another board and topic). As good as XP is/was it was time to move on. Still use XP here and there.

Only problems I had with Win7 install was findind the right drivers for my Network/Internet access and printer. Used XP install for that. (Now have all drivers backed up to CD).

No fancy PC But it is performing to my satifaction so far.

I ran 7 on this for a while.
A-2200

Motherboard - PCChips M848A (v5.0) SiS Socket A ATX Motherboard
Processor - 2.2GHZ AMD Athlon XP 3200+ 400MHZ FSB 512K Barton Core
Ram - A-Data 1024 Meg x2 for 2048 Megs of 400MHZ DDR 3200
Hard Drive - 80 Gig Westerndigital
Video - GEFORCE FX5500 256 Meg, AGP 8x
Monitor - 17 inch Samsung Syncmaster 750s
Sound Card - Creative Sound Blaster Live 5.1
Speakers - Logitech R-20 2.1, 2 plus sub
Optical Drive - A-Open 16x DVD
NIC - SiS 900-Based onboard Fast Ethernet Adapter
Wireless - D-Link DWA-552 Extreme "N" Wireless PCI Adapter
USB - Integrated SiS 7001 6 USB
Keyboard - Logitech Access 600 USB
Mouse - Logitech Optical USB

Aero worked OK for me. Getting the sound to work was the big problem. Modded driver fixed that in the end. Just so you know running 7 in a virtual PC mode isn't a good test as it uses the virtual hardware not your true hardware. You can install and run 7 for 30 days without having to enter your product code or activate it. If you have to go back to XP no harm done and you haven't used your product code.

DocBrown said:

stammer,

Welcome to The Dinosaurs Club

Thanks DocBrown: Being that my main usage PC in a 2005 I really didn't thinks of it as a dinosaur. But I am kind-of honored to be in the Dinosours Club. I just cant seem to keep away from my main use PC (2005 hp A1203w). Always been good to me and reliable. Only times I had any problems it, is when tinker with it (sometimes causing me to do a fresh install.

Sorry to get of topic. Please accept my apologies.