Component help on an ageing motherboard

Hi all. I'm looking to upgrade as cheaply as possible for an eldery friend. His computer is an acer & i have these details :

Summary
Operating System
Windows XP Professional 32-bit SP3
CPU
AMD Sempron 3200+ 49 °C
Manila 90nm Technology
RAM
512MB Single-Channel DDR2 @ 200MHz (4-4-4-12)
Motherboard
Acer EM61SM/EM61PM (Socket M2 ) 40 °C
Graphics
AL1707 A ([email protected])
NVIDIA ÿÿÿÿ (Elitegroup)
Storage
76GB Hitachi HDS728080PLA380 (SATA) 45 °C
7GB SanDisk Cruzer Blade USB Device (USB)
Optical Drives
HL-DT-ST DVD+-RW GSA-H21N
Audio
Unimodem Half-Duplex Audio Device


I can't seem to find a pic or the specs of the mothertboard online and until i look inside the machine (which will be the next time i see him and i hope to have the bits by then) i'm not even sure if it's an AGP or a PCI (maybe PCI-e) number. Shame the bios date isn't included. I'm thinking of 4GB DDR2 800, some graphics (AGP, PCI?), and possibly a newer cpu (although i don't know if a 64 bit chip would run on his existing os
. As far as the hdd goes, i at least got that covered, heh. Any advice much appreiciated
Many thanks

 

it would be better to buy a new pc, than to try to upgrade xp for a later os.

 

Thanks Elizabeth23 but he's really quite happy with xp. It's more just a matter of finding a spec sheet and ideally a picture of the mobo and swapping out for some cheap upgrades.

 

https://www.google.com/search?q=ace...niv&sa=X&ei=dzD0VKDeKYKWNpmKgNgN&ved=0CB0QsAQ

images of motherboard

https://www.google.com/#q=acer+em61sm+em61pm+motherboard+specs
search page for specs, if you give me the model number and model of acer, I can look for the manual which will have your specs.

 

Wow! That's really cool. No need for the manual I just really needed a look at the board.

Many thanks

 

you are welcome.

 

Hi. Just browsing ebay. What is the best chip the mobo would accept? Will it take an athlon 2 x2? Seems that that is an am2+ chip. Lookinking for an am chip (more specifically, an m2 chip). Hoping not to have to bother the bios!

EDIT: The chip I'm looking at is: AMD ADX2500CK23GM Athlon II X2 250 DC 3GHZ 2MB Processor

It's very cheap but will it work?

Thanks

 

https://www.google.com/#q=AMD+ADX2500CK23GM+Athlon+II+X2+250+DC+3GHZ+2MB+Processor,+review

you can read through some reviews above, I am not up on hardware replacement, but maybe someone else might help.

You also might post it as a new question so others will see it.

 

Thanks. Doing so now.

 

http://us.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/support

above is acer support you might want to post to them also, I have not seen anyone answer your other post yet, thought JoJo or Aunty Jack might have an idea.