Not enough Memory. How much should I Get?

I recently purchased Doom 3. I read the minimum system requirements and it said you need a minimun of 384 ram. I only have 256 ram. The game is really laggy for me. If i were to go out and buy 256 more ram would the game work better. And if i got 512 more ram would I be able to run the game at high quality setting?

The more RAM the better. However, the rest of your hardware may have something to do with your performance issues as well.

Edit: The following hardware guide can help give you an idea of how doom3 will run on your system.
http://www2.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjQ0

i have a pentium 4 1.59ghz & an nvidia Geforce 3 video card. Would I have to upgrade any of those or is it just the Ram I need?

512 would let you run it at the low quality setting. 1gb lets you runs medium quality, and 2gb is for high quality.

insertwackynamehere said:

512 would let you run it at the low quality setting. 1gb lets you runs medium quality, and 2gb is for high quality.

That information is grossly inaccurate. Especially considering his video card.

bean59: Your video card and processor are at about the minimum requirements for running the game at its lowest settings. Increasing your RAM amount will help. But your overall performance will still not be wonderful due to your video card. Consider upgrading that as well if possible.

Would it be better to buy a new video card thats like 128mb or just to go with the ram? I want the game just to run smoothly with no lagg and medium or low visual settings.

If you absolutely must choose between upgrading RAM or getting a new vid card, then I personally would choose the RAM. At least you'll then meet the minimum system requirements. And the game should run decently at the lowest settings (someone please correct me if I'm wrong).

Of course, if you can afford to upgrade both, then do so.

I have 512 megs RAM, a Radeon 9700 and an Athlon 1700+ and occassionally have some lag in medium. So even if you double your RAM and get the best graphics card available, you may still experience some slow down because of your processor.

insertwackynamehere said:

512 would let you run it at the low quality setting. 1gb lets you runs medium quality, and 2gb is for high quality.

Eer I have 1 GB and run Hi-Quality just fine. The video quality is supposed to be related to your video card RAM not your system RAM (i.e. from Id themselves 64MB low 128MB med 256 MB hi 512MB* ultra)

*Of course there are no 512MB vid cards yet, but you can still get away with Ultra if you have a very good system.

there are a couple, but they're 600-700 USD

How about the adavanced features? (shadows, bump mapping) Do you need an even better system specs to turn them on?