Hey people I'm going to upgrade my computer soon. I work in 3D graphics and which one is more important for 3D, RAM or CPU speed? I have AMD Barton 2600+ RAM 512mb M/B Biostar M7NCD PRO Graphics Geforce FX 5200 128mb I want to get AMD Barton 3000+ RAM 1GB M/B MSI Deluxe graphics same is this good? if it's not good what can you advise me?

I happen to prefer AMDs for graphics. There are reasons, though it's really personal preference. a gig of ram is good. the video card you have is decent. sounds like you're set up with a good system

Well, both. :-) More RAM enables your computer to easier open big files. 1 GB is good, but 2 GB would be even better. OTOH, for 3D graphics the CPU is important because all the calculations during rendering are done in the CPU. Oh, yeah, there are some breakthrough technologies to use GPU (graphics processor on the card) for rendering, but they are still just breakthroughs, not regular occurence. Get a stronger CPU if you can afford it. Still, I'd upgrade the video just on the principle. (Look who's talking. I still have GeForce 2 Ti with 64 MB RAM. :-))

The question of which CPU to use for 3D is very dependant on the application being used and whether the app uses SSE2 instructions or is multi-threaded. For instance Lightwave is multi-threaded and uses SSE2 so it usually runs best on a P4. Apps which use SSE2 will generally run faster on P4 or AMD64 processors. Apps which don't use SSE instructions (i.e. Terragen) will generally run fastest on an AMD athlon with the highest clock speed. I'd suggest asking about CPU's on the fora for the applications you use to see what people recommend. More RAM is a good investment as not having enough will cause the system to use virtual RAM (the page/swap file)on the hard disk which will slow any application more than a slightly slower CPU.

I've always preferred AMD to Intel for graphics, although the computer I'm using now came with an Intel P4 and I can't see any difference in speed on graphic programs. Depending on which programs you're using, the amount of RAM will probably make more difference than whether you use an AMD or Intel. If you've got Photoshop, you already know it's a memory hog and so are all of the render/modeling software packages I've used, though I still think Photoshop is the worst in pigging out on your RAM. I run Photoshop at the same time I run Poser and at 1 GB RAM, I'm still having to close and reopen both programs frequently. If you've got something like Max3d and Painter open at the same time, you can forget it. If you can afford it, spring for 2 GB RAM.

It's both but never forget about the HDD. No matter how much RAM you have, it still depends on your SWAP (PAGING) file. So even if you have the best set RAM and CPU, a lame HDD configuration will mess it up for you. You don't really have to spend a fortune like I had done (4x37GB 15000rpm scsi-raid) IT STILL HURTS!!! But you can even get very good results with (2x80GB 7200rpm IDE-RAID) which would cost you not a big deal at all. My final word will be, it is never about having 1 part good, it is a matter of the overall. So instead of paying a fortune for 1 part and lowering the costs on other parts, work on something which is HI in OVERALL. I hope I have been able to help you out. Umut