lean on the back end of your car on one side of it right above the wheel and jump off of it quickly. if the car comes straight up and doesnt rock up and down, you should be good with the suspension. but if it rocks up and down, the suspension could be pretty much shot. thats what it sounds like because of what you said with your friends.
now how low do you want to be dropped? it all depends on how low you want, how stiff you want the ride to be and if you care or not about your front bumper scraping every once ina while to forfeit it for looks and handling.
Do you just want a cheap setup but still be good? Just want struts and springs or a whole coilover setup? A good strut spring setup would be KYB AGX and eibach pro-kit or else if you want a little lower, eibach sportlines.look here to compare
http://www.eibach.com/cgi-bin/htmlos...57387000017632 Ive also heard good things about ground control, friend has it on rsx-s and another on gsr. they both ride pretty good, but may be too stiff for some. Now if you want the whole suspension coilover setup it will cost a little more, but you get what you pay for. Tein is a good company for these.theres also skunk2, tanabe, jic-magic, hks, apexi and a few others. it all comes down to what you want.