Definitely download a CPU temperature monitor to confirm.

As far as your RAM, you should be running 2 GB at LEAST. I assume you're running XP 32bit so you can put up to 4 GB of RAM, although the operating system will only make 3.25 available to you. The more RAM, the better.
Also, if you do upgrade your RAM, go with DDR2 (double data rate / dual channel) and get a pair of them. Doing this will let them run in dual channel mode and you'll have a lot better performance. I'd say you should go ahead and get 2 sticks of 1GB (preferably Kingston) DDR2 RAM with no higher than a CAS latency of 5. Whatever you do, just make sure both sticks are exactly the same and are not "rebuilt". Then you can add those two sticks to your existing 1 (or pair of 2 512 sticks, provided you have 4 slots)

As far as your graphics card, you're using an onboard graphics card and should seriously consider a better one. You can find add-in PCI-E graphics cards at any computer retail store. Your best bet in this department is either Nvidia or ATI. Just find something with at least 256MB, preferably 512MB. (you can even get 1GB, but it won't be necessary. I can play Crysis on high settings with an Nvidia 9600GT at 512MB)
One thing to keep in mind is what kind of ports will be on the card itself. If you're connecting to your monitor with a standard VGA connector (blue D connector), then you'll need one of those on the card. If you're connecting with DVI (white connector) then you'll need one of those, respectively. If you use dual monitors, you'll obviously need a card with dual ports of whatever you use to connect the monitors.

Your processor is decent at 3 GHZ, so I wouldn't worry too much about that because they're more expensive to upgrade. I run a dual core and it's pretty speedy, but it's pricey. I'd upgrade the other two items before thinking about upgrading your processor, as you may find that it's more than sufficient for what you want to do.

So in recap, upgrades to look into:

RAM

• (2) DDR2 1GB Kingston sticks at 400mhz, CAS latency 5 (or lower)

VIDEO

• (1) PCI-E Nvidia or ATI graphics card at 256MB or 512MB

If you do those two upgrades, you should be able to play any game currently on the PC market.
But before you even think of upgrading, you need to track down the exact cause of the overheating, because you may end up having to replace something more important than an upgrade.

Thank you, this is extremely helpful. If it turns out it is overheating that's the problem, I'll probably just get what I need to fix that and then upgrade the video card and RAM, as you said, rather than make a new computer from scratch, although that is something I want to do at some point anyway, just for the experience.

Only thing is, my friend who recently made his own computer told me to get DDR3 RAM, or something along those lines?

chances are DDR3 will NOT work with your mobo. i like Speccy for temps and more. what does your core idle at?

I have MP3s in windows media player that I want to transfer to itunes. When I go to itunes and hit add new folder to library and select the folder I want, nothing happens. What should i do?

DOM:

To go along with what Trace87 said, DDR3 (triple channeling) can only be run by motherboards that support it. You'd have to look up your motherboard online and see if it supports it, but chances are it won't due to it being a low-end every-day consumer type of computer that's 4 years old. It might be worth a look, but I'm pretty sure your motherboard won't support DDR3.

I have two cores but I'm not sure what you mean by what they idle at. That program's very helpful by the way, thank you. Yes, my motherboard is only DDR2 compatible

You're right, my motherboard is only DDR2 compatible. But if I were to get a new motherboard DDR3 would be a good feature to have right?


Hmm, you could maybe try adding the songs one by one? Not really sure I'm afraid.

Idle temps can be found by opening speccy when you have no other programs running.

Yes buying a mobo compatible with DDR3 would be a good idea moving forward. However this could also cause you to have to replace your CPU(processor) because the socket type(processor slot) on your mobo.

I really have no idea about this.

I wouldn't upgrade an entire motherboard just for the sake of DDR3 compatibility, but if you're going to upgrade your mobo anyway, it's definitely a good idea to ensure that your processor is supported first, if you're not planning on getting another processor.
DDR3 RAM is more expensive than DDR2, and you need sets of 3 for triple channeling to work, so you're looking at spending more money than you may want or need to.

Honestly, my mobo is only DDR2 compatible and it's still a beast. If I were you, I'd just settle on what you have and do those upgrades we talked about and you'll see a massive difference. Wait to upgrade your mobo and processor when there's a real need to.

i still run ddr2 and my computer is pretty awesome.

HEEEEEEEEEEELP! My laptop has a virus. My baby! :( I don't know what to do. Currently using desktop computer, but in desperate need of help. Laptop will start normally and bring me to my desktop, but then whenever I click on anything, I get a message saying ''x.y file is infected''. I don't have an anti virus programme, and my computer won't let me surf the internet, instead a page comes up warning me that it's too dangerous to surf normally, so it's a bit of a pickle. :(