help upgrading processor

I want to make my computer faster and I cannot afford a new one. I want to see what processors are compatible with my motherboard so I can upgrade. I have an MSI Athlon Motherboard - 950 MHz (that's what the gateway website told me anyway). Can anyone give me any information on what is compatible? And is it worth my time? I also want to upgrade my RAM. I have heard that it is pretty simple, but I have never done this. Any tips? Newbie questions I know. But I just replace my cd drive for a dvd drive and it wasn't hard, so I think I can handle this if I can just find out the right hardware to install. Thanks in advance!

Hello there! What is the make and model of the computer, it's a Gateway ??? Cheers Troy

It is a Gateway model K7-950.

hi, MSI is the boards manufacturer. It appears to be a AMD athlon k7- 950 Mhz CPU from what you posted. Boards only support up to a certain range- Mhz cpu. Your CPU may be the "top" cpu for the board or it may not be. Another CPU could require a updated BIOS also. Lets say you went from 950 to a 1.2GHz CPU, that may not make a noticeable difference in over all performance. You will have to know more details about your board, its version and BIOS version. You may be better off just adding more RAM which will improve performance. Stick with name brand memory if you go that way, like Crucial, Kingston, OCZ, Patriot, Mushkin. Most of these sites have memory tools that will tell you what you need to buy for your make/model.

Shelf Life has said pretty much what I'd say, I don't think you'd really be able to get a great deal of extra performance out of this computer. I admit it's probably not worth spending the extra $$$ on. The Crucial website has one of the scanners Shelf Life mentioned, run a scan on your system and report the results back here. Troy