Need to finalize my selection - please help me decide

[DisinfectedDuck]

Since i live in Israel and somehow prices here are twice as expensive as in the u.s I cannot miss this golden opportunity that i'll be going to the u.s in 9 days. I have to order the components to my uncle's house in NY asap and I need help finalizing my decision. What I have so far is:
Epox 8K7A
Athlon TB 1.4
2x 256MB DDR 2100 Crucial
Pioneer DVD

I don't intend to overclock as i've never done that before. I want this rig to be the best that money can buy (Although no dual cpu's or raid) and it'll be used mainly for gaming. Here's my questions -

1. I can't decide on soundcard. I want a 5.1 output one to go with the Pro-Media 5.1 speakers I intend to get. I want the best sound quality for games, music and DVD. Any thoughts?

2. Should I get the OEM version of the Athlon TB and get myself a better HSF althought I don't intend to overclock at the moment?

3. What HD should I get? The IBM 60GXP is very popular but I heared it's fragile and crashes more frequently then other HD's. Any thoughts on this?

If you think there something wrong with my selection (ex: better mobo) or any incompatabilities please point them out. Advice and comments are welcome.
Thanks a lot, this forum is the best place for expert advice, especially for a newbie like me

 

[andalas]

1. Turtle beach Santa Cruz or Hercules Gaming XP
2. Get OEM and put a better HSF on it.
3. I can't tell you much about IDE but 60GXP ain't as bad as 75GXP
My last IDE died and take around 40GB of MP3 with it, so I'm sticking
with SCSI drive now. I never had any scsi drive died on me.

Your selection is good maybe you want to get Thunderbird that has palomino core in it.

 

[Guilty]

Turtle Beach Santa Cruz or Hercules GameTheater XP if you want the desktop box for extra connections.

Go OEM and get a Tai-Sol 760B. It's deafult fan is very quiet, but if you wanted to overclock later it can be mounted with larger more powerful fans and do quite well. Another one to consider is the Glaciator, it's supposed to be pretty quiet and effective.

The 60GXP is doing much better in my opinion, there just arent anywhere near as many reports of failures with them. Although my 75GXP is 10months old and running fine... If you're still uncomfortable you can go Maxtor, but dont delute yourself into thinking any brand is flawless.

Pretty good combination on the parts otherwise, I own a 16X Pioneer DVD and it makes my ears bleed though. Look into Toshiba.

If you order from NewEgg, FedEx saver will be fine; if you order from MWave DONT get UPS Ground, I've used MWave and UPS ground several times to ship to NY and it took 7 days every time.

 

[Shmorq]

Will the power supply you order in the US be compatible in Israel? Just wondering since your power lines might have a different frequency and voltage.

Personal choices:
1) Turtle Beach Santa Cruz sound card
2) OEM CPU and any other heatsink since it'll be better than the stock one
3) I've always built my computers with the IBM 60GXP lately and nobody's had a problem with it so far. (Been only 4 months at most so not much of a test.) Or you might wanna take a chance with the new Seagate Barracuda IV which is supposedly the quietest HD ever made. Not many reviews on this one, but if it's half as good as the company hype, it's definitely worth taking a chance.

 

[MrBond]

Everyone else has suggested what I would.

Toshiba DVD drives can be flashed to reigon free. That might be important to you. My pioneer drive will let me switch reigons 5 times before it locks itself to one. I have no interest in a reigon free DVD player, so I never checked to see if I could flash mine. Toshiba drives are quieter, but many suffer from very slow DVD rip speeds.

 

[DisinfectedDuck]

I think i'll go with the Toshiba dvd then, I hear it's more reliable. I don't know about the power supply, gotta check that out. I still can't decide on a Sound card or a HD. any advice that will help me finally choose one will be great . When you buy a retail version of the TB, the HSF is already connected to the cpu?

 

[Jeff H]

DisinfectedDuck, some thoughts:

1) Go OEM, and get a Taisol CGK760092 Cu bottomed HSF. Good three point clip and quiet, if you're not going to overclock it.

2) Get a good power supply, your TBird will thank you for it. Enermax 430w.

3) I'd go Maxtor DiamondMax +60 for hard drive. I just built a CUSLC-2 / iP!!!866 system for my neighbor and we put the Maxtor 30G in there. Fast and quiet.

 

[AvidOC]

Is The 8K7A Even a DDR Board?

Why Dont you get a Creative Soundcard? like a Creative Live! 5.1 Card

 

[wfbberzerker]

yes 8k7a is a ddr board

stick with oem version of card and get hsf from somewhere else

get hercules game theatre xp sound card

get a western digital 40gb 60gxp or whatever its called for a hard drive