Mannn, thats a sad ending to the tale. I was on the edge of my seat during the whole story up till the reveal.
Very resiliant machine though. Even through all of those updates and being covered in dust in a shed for a decade, it STILL started. Absolutely wild. Not to sound cliche but they really don't make machines like that anymore. Probably can't do the old "Put Linux on it" trick with something like that though (nor would you want to. Both for memories and because a genuine Windows XP install is getting harder and harder to come by as the old machines die or get overwritten).
Hahaha, yeeeeeah I was pretty disappointed after all of that too. I was really hoping to find some long lost stuff you know?? I couldn't be mad at my brother about it, he's just not the sentimental type and was probably finally excited to have his very own computer after a whole life of having to share everything as the youngest sibling.