I need advice on buying/upgrading a system

[dtowntech]

Greetings all,
I just bought a friends old desktop. He is an avid online-gamer and always buys new every 12-18 months. The system I bought isn't that old, I guess.
He had it built custom for gaming at the time. It had been sitting unused for the last year, until I bought it a month ago.

My question is about what this system is good for, vs. buying/or upgrading newer.

The specs I have on this system are:
Windows XP home SP2
80 GB hard drive. (6 GB used)
Processor - this is where I am confused.. The system shows as a dual-processor capability/functionality. It reads as 2.8, 2.8 Intel P4s. Is the 2.8 spec. the total sum of both or 2.8's or is it running at 5.6(combined)?
1 GB RAM
Raedon 9200 Video Card - (I think 128MB on the card)
DVD ROM drive
DVD/RW drive
NIC Card
There are 4 unused slots off the motherboard.

I bought it for 200 last month. He said he paid 2000 in 2-04 when it was built.
It has a nice custom see-through case with at least 3 fans.

Is it worth upgrading the video card and what to recommend..? What about the RAM? It has no sound card installed either. I would like install the best sound card compatable for this system. I have used Sound Blaster in the past and was impressed. I would like to keep this system, but only if I can upgrade to the most recent compatable hardware - (DVD,TV card,gaming)

Thanks for the help.

[Rick]

If you can Please post the mother board make and model.
it should be silk screened on the mother board itself
Or better yet if you have the doc's for it

I'm not a gamer so I have no idea what is the best game video card

The Dual core CPU is a 2.8 Ghz
What the numbers you are looking at mean
The CPU ( one cpu) is running both it's core at 2.8
If in fact it has a dual core cpu installed

If you open control panel and the system
It will show you the details about the system including the type of cpu
In device manager you can click on the processor and see if it lists 1 or 2
If it shows 2 then you do in fact have a dual core

Two things I would upgrade are the hard drive and the memory
add a second hard drive ( they are cheap under $100 for 160 to 300 gig )
and another gig of memory

[xLastShotx]

Hmm, It doesn't sound like its to bad but it definitely isn't very "new". If you post the tech specs it would be easier to say, Mother Board Model, Ram Speed. The CPU Is a bit old the core 2 duo's replaced the p4 core twos along time ago, but hey if this computer is a lot better than the one you had before than hey, why not. It wouldn't be worth upgrading the video card to the best thing your system would just create a bottleneck else ware. If you post the motherboard model I could show you good parts that would work for your system.

[dtowntech]

Greetings again,
I was waiting for the holiday to have the time to check back and to get some more info for you about this system. The updated spces are as follows,

motherboard - It reads as an Intel desktop board #D865PERL
processor - It is an Intel dual-core P4 - 2.8Ghz
video card - Radeon 9200 (128 MB)
RAM - Kingston 512's (2) - with two more open RAM slots
Hard Drive - Barracuda 7200 80GB
Raidmax power supply and fans(4)

I have now installed a Creative SB audio card.

I was interested in knowing the advatages of a second hard drive, and what to do about RAM (just add two more 512s)?

I am going to keep this sysem and wanted to know the best upgrades for the money invested vs. the performance gains.

Thanks again for the feedback.
Best Regards