questions about westone raider 2 guitar and strings

recently i picked up a westone raider 2 guitar at a pawn shop for $170 (nz money, so that's about 85 USA) thinking it would make a great guitar for the kind of music i play (technical, brutal death metal) but now that i've got it home i think my fender strat actually has a heavier tone, as well as a better lead sound... fuck, a better everything sound. could it just be that the strings on the westone are old school and quite rusty? would modern strings give it a better sound? the guitar looks like its from about the mid eighties... maybe its only suited to playing music from that period in time? i tried taking the bottom 3 strings off my fender and putting them on the westone, and it did sound a bit better... but i still think the fender sounds heavier and all around nicer. The fender gives more distortion and low bassy chunk, which is weird since it only has 4 regular pick ups and the westone has uhh... 2 sets of those grunt/gain pick ups... can't think of the proper name for them right now. the westone does have quite a bit of rust, dirt and fluff around the pick ups and shit... would that affect the sound at all? is this guitar a piece of shit, good or what?

please help if you can. thanks. later