what to upgrade next?

[bernard]

Hello,

I've been away from this site for a while now.  My MAME machine has been finished, and I've only now revisited it for the sake of upgrading.

I didn't have much of a system installed in my first incarnation, but I didn't need very much to run what I wanted.

I wanted it to be a little more versatile, so I've upgraded the hardware a bit, and now I'm up to :

Pentium III 600Mhz processor
320 MB RAM
16MB AGP video card

I've also upgraded to a newer version of MAME v.94 and I'm using the AdvanceMenu frontend, running in Windows98.  I was running in DOS on my original config, but lately I've been hearing that the newer versions of MAME run better in Windows (video drivers, memory management, etc.).

My new system runs very well, but some games are kind of choppy still, and they're games that really shouldn't be (like Tapper).

What should I upgrade first, what would make the most difference?  I'm thinking video card?

Or have I been away too long, and I should set up the machine or OS completely different?

Like I said, it's running acceptably right now, but what should I do next, or do differently to get it running even better/smoother?

Any ideas?  Thank you very much.

[pointdablame]

do NOT run mame .94 on a 600mhz system.

Video cards make no difference whatsoever in MAME... it is all CPU.

Drop your MAME version down from .94 and you should have a much, much better performing system.

If I were you, I'd be running a full setup fo MAME .55 on that cab.. and if you want some of the games from newer versions, I'd set up a few different newer versions of MAME just to run those games specifically.

[AlanS17]

If you want to upgrade something, upgrade the processor.

[Tiger-Heli]

Agree with all the other comments, and if you still wanted to upgrade, order should be

1) Processor
2) RAM (amount)
3) Video