please knock some sense into my little brother

ok heres the deal.
my brother was talkinga bout buying a new gfx card right. he has an 18yr old friend with cert 4 in I.T and he does watever he says when it comes to computers, yes hes good with computers but some of his advice is making my brother waste his money.
I told him there is no point in buying a new gfx card when its a p4 2.4 ghz on a 478 board with 1 gig value ram and a tiny PSU, it will just bottleneck at the CPU/mobo. I told him counter strike SOURCE (a game) is CPU dependant but no him adn his mate say im wrong.

he just bought a 7800GS 256 mb agp card for $290 (i found one for $190 on the net) i told him it would make little - no difference in source. guess wat his fps havnt increased at all suprise suprise. i told him again " i told you source is cpu dependant. besides putting that card in that machine is a waste, its like putting a super charger on a barina" so now instead of listening to me ( i told him to take it back and spend 800$ on a 4600+ am2 system with mobo, ram, cpu, gfx and possibly a new PSU) now he reckons hes found a 3.5 ghz processor for $91. i told him "still a wasyte of money ITS 478 for christ sake. If ghz meant everything dont u think i woulda gone that direction instead of a 2.4 ghz chip. chip architecture has alot to do with it" but noooo he thinks this will get him 100+ fps constant, yeh true it might break 100 but id be extramely suprised if it stayed above 100. when i try tell him he and his mate are wrong he says "ur just scared that mine will b better than yours for $500, bryce has got a cert4 in IT wat would you know, he could get ur computer for 2 grand" then i say "he also said hed get u that gfx card for half price" hmmmm $300 for a 7800GS GOOD BUY MATE!!!! here look at this heres the same card for $190 top job.

anyway i feel guilty because the only reason hes intent on upgrading is cause hes jealous of mine. If he wont listen to me maybe he will listen to you guys. Please can u state whether you think source is CPU dependant or not and if u think that its possible to get 100+fps constant on a 4-5 year old intel socket 478, AGP, 533 mobo.

cheers

Indeed, it also doesn't make sense to have 100+fps. The screen refresh rate tops out mostly at 75/85 Hz, and if I'm not mistaken games usually set it to 60 Hz.

So if the game plays at 40+ fps constantly, there is absolutely no need to upgrade anything :-)

currently I'd say I know more about current computer hardware on the market than my dad, but he would know everything about anything he was told about em he just hasn't read up on em (he is one of the top IT pros in NSW Australia), but he refuses to buy me parts dammit! , he is proud of his 6600GT that he bought like a yr ago for $150 aus, but he always tries to run EVERYTHING on high graphics, and he gets to an FPS like quake 4, and I say, TURN DOWN THE GRAPHICS ITS SO CLUNKY, and he can't even see how unsmooth it is. ARRGH! thats what annoys me.

/rant

I love these cases when someone always listen to someone they think is l337 with computers. They are NOOBS for listening to NOOBS if you guys for the sake of this post want CS language. I have seen a million times when people listen to others who have no clue about anything. The blind leading the blind hahahhahahahhaha

I suggest you pull a reverse psychology on him. Instead of getting angry and trying to give him a good advice, just laugh at him for spending so much to squeeze a little performance on a dinosaur. He might soon catch on and think twice before taking his friend's advice. Or it can backfire and he will hate you forever.