Good drive. The only NEC drive i'd ever consider
as far as the graphics card goes, I honestly haven't doen a whole lot of gaming since the orginal half-life came out and honestly haven't looked into graphics cards since then. again, compared to the geforce 2 mx 400 I am used to, I am sure this card would scream, but if you have any suggestions for a better relatively cheap card, I am all ears!
Well there are a couple options here:
1. Stay with the GF2MX ... this is if you really dont intend to do much gaming
2. You can get a really really basic gaming card like a GeForceFX5200 (128bit) or a Radeon9200(128bit) both of which come in 128MB adn 256MB models. It's a waste [of money] to get the 256MB cards as the bottleneck is the processing capacity of the video chip. Other options in this category include the Radeon9600SE (not reccomended because you drop down to a 64bit memory interface) and the GeForce5500/5600/5700LE (these cards arent exactly in the same price ballpark but not really a stretch for basic gaming).
3. The midrange gaming card field has seen a fairly significant change over the last few months ... whilst it used to be a 9600Pro/XT, 9800SE(128bit)/9800 and 5700/5700Ultra market the inception of the GeForce6600 ($120USD) and the GeForce6600GT ($190USD) have since covered the sub-200 price bracket extremely well. The Radeon9800Pro is another card worth mention however the GeForce6600GT, priced cheaper, is often a better performer by significant margins.
As for a reccomendation, I'd grab a 6600GT ... it will last you a bit and allow you to play most games with most of the eye candy at max full without going too expensive.
the reason I decided against the MSI board is because I made a bad experience with my last one. so my choice was between the A8V from asus and the abit board you mentioned. I probably won't be doing any oc'ing for the time being, so I really didn't take that into consideration. the reason I decided for the asus, rather then the abit board is simply that I have had nothing but good experiences with asus
Aye i hear ya; the MSI board, while stock-for-stock will outperform both the AV8 and A8V, the performance improvement is not earth shattering and considering that (a) you dont intend to OC and (b) the price jump, either the A8V and the AV8 make good choices.