More RAM or different CPU ...more bang for my pound

another gig of ram will run you about $60USD: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145505

since you do video and photo editting, a faster cpu or dual core would help. this athlon 64 4000+ will give you a small boost for $60USD: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103037
a better choice would be a dual-core athlon x2 3800+. it effectively gives you 2 CPUs which are as fast as your existing 3200+ for $80USD. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103052

so, a dual core and another gig would give your system a big boost for only $140USD.

RAM is usually the better investment. CPUs spend most of their time sitting around waiting for more data to crunch, so the more RAM you have, the more data you can have stored in a reasonably high speed area to be shipped off to the CPU.

As for dual core... For it to really make any difference at all, the video editing program has to be able to make use of more than a single CPU/core. It's something that has to be written into the program, you can't just expect it to magically happen by popping in a dual core CPU. You could manually distribute the load across the two cores, but you'd spend more of your time doing that then anything else.

Now, high end programs, like those from Adobe, have been multi-CPU/core aware for several years. Lower end, and thus cheaper, are going to be hit or miss.

Of course all of that is based on the assumption your motherboard can even handle dual core CPUs, which not all can.

The other thing to consider, is that for most people running XP, after about 1GB of RAM the law of diminishing returns kicks in. You get less and less bang for the buck/pound. You might want to think of RAM and CPU as kind of like a seesaw. With most systems, the CPU end is considerably heavier. The idea is to try and get the two equally balanced. For most people that's around the 1GB mark. If you're doing a lot of high end video work, I might go to 1.5-2GB, but probably no higher.

Also, it being early in the morning and my being too lazy to go look up the socket for the 2GHz 3200+, it's important to note the socket type for AMD CPUs. There's been about 3-4 of them in the past few years. The 754, 939, and AM2 are what come to mind. You want to be sure that if you get a replacement CPU, it's the proper socket type so it will actually fit. That will limit your selection of CPUs considerably, since if you have a 754 board, dual core is completely out of the question.

So at the end of the rambling analysis, I would say RAM is probably your better bet. If you're doing a lot of video work, a second larger HDD might not go awry either.

The biggest bang for the buck comes with a RAM upgrade. Doubling your RAM gives you more of a performance gain than say doubling your processor clock speed.

Of course, doing both gives you a synergistic gain but the processor upgrade generally costs you more for less performance gain. Prices for both are falling though, especially if you don't have the latest generation RAM or CPU.

the answer to this is simple i believe - your system has a decent amount of ram - adding more will not be noticeable in general use.
you should also note that 32bit processors can only access 2GB max.

Instead get a dual core athlon 64 x2 3600 as suggested above - you will really notice a difference, particularly in responsiveness, and video encoding is faster (I use sony vegas), while leaving your system peppy for other duties.

Of course to take advantage of 64 bit capabilites (and address your motherboard's entire 4GB memory address space) you will need a 64bit OS like Vista 64 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116204

unfortunately, software is lagging and Sony Vegas for example will not be supporting vista 64 until late 2007 - but even running in xp 32 bit mode you will see improvement.

my friend was in a similar situation to yours but after upgrading him as above the result was gorgeous - now his friends want the same

your current processor is not that great!

cheers,
Simon

A method I use is the Task Manager. I real time I can monitor the CPU and memory usage on a given task or multiple tasks. Always remember tho it is not just the CPU/memory that creates a fast system. The MB also plays a part.

Also visit Videoguys, wealth of information on Video editing and system requirements.

Luck

Bill