I can run the Bioshock demo on the lowest settings, and it's managable, but still choppy. What would be the best thing to upgrade, and by best thing I mean what will give me the most bang for my buck and won't be terribly expensive. Here's what I got:

AMD Opteron Dual Core at 1.81ghz
2.75 GB DDR PC3200 RAM (two 1 gig sticks, a 512 mb and a 256 mb that were left over)
nVidia GeForce 7600 GS (SLI)

I'm thinking another SLI video card for dual gpu processing... But any other suggestions? Where's my bottleneck?

(Also, I didn't update my video drivers after the Bioshock install. Would that help?)

Your RAM won't be running as fast as it can having those bits and pieces in there that don't match (i think). This would mean that your memory won't be running in dual channel mode, as to whether this is a big'y...probably not.

Two 7600's in SLI should not be an issue in theory ( I know someone running it with one just fine)...but...I've never messed around with SLI myself, what I do know is that it can sometimes make the game run slower if the SLI profile for the game isn't up to date.

Have you checked to see that the driver version you are running has a profile for BioShock? If not, I've checked and the newest version has one, you might just need to update your drivers.

Your processor is a little on the slow-ish side but is a good one, I doubt the problem lies there.

Also, have you tried the dual-core optimization fix for amd processors? I remember reading somewhere bioshock capitalizes a lot on dual-cores so that might help.

can you explain that gettle or link me somewhere?

(updating drivers now.. we'll see if that helps any)

"Bioshock.exe has stopped working."

not too familiar with the AMD chips but you should definitely upgrade your gfx card, maybe to a 7900 gtx? i think your RAM should be fine.

I think the video card is your main problem. Just for kicks, pull the 512mb and 256mb DIMMs and see how it runs. My system is quite similar, but I'm running an A64 x2 and a 7900GT. Can you overclock your processor at all?

I probably could.. I'm not having any overheating issues or anything as it is...

worth a shot I guess. I haven't tried since updating the drivers, so I'll check it out later, and I'll try taking out the other mem cards if I'm still having trouble.. If I don't notice a difference, maybe it's time for a new 3d card..

QUestion though.. My board has dual PCI-E slots.. So should I run both a new card and the current? Or just the new? ANd if both do I want to put the new (better) one in the primary slot or does it matter?

I've never owned an SLI board...not sure if you can run multiple PCIe cards without SLI - if you did, you'd want to run your new card as the primary card & use it for gaming..the second would be for another display. IMHO, you're better off buying a single new card than another 7600 for SLI (if you can SLI yours - I dunno). I think I paid $135 for my 7900GT a couple of months back.

Aside from the video card, I think my system is quite similar to yours - A64 x2 3600 (1.9Ghz), 2Gb DDR2 & a 7900GT. However, I do have a significant overclock (currently running at 2.47Ghz), which does help a bit. If you can afford it, pick up a new graphics card & see how it works for ya.