I'm gonna be ordering parts for a new build in about two weeks and I have some questions about the hardware I've selected. The desktop computer will be primarily for gaming.

CPU
Core 2 Duo e8400 (This I am fairly set on)

GPU
evga Geforce 8800gt
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814130318
Only question here is: Is it worth it to get the model with the AKIMBO dual slot cooling configuration? I am mainly conserned about noise and I am not doing SLI.

MOBO
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128059
Any downsides to this board? Heard somewhere that it doesn't have optical audio out...will I still get High Def. 5.1 digital audio?

CASE
Antec 900 -- Had my heart set on this, but then saw that Newegg discontinued it. Is this board on the way out? If so, please suggest something similar -- good looks, clear side panel, good air cooling.

PSU
Haven't decided yet....something around 500W should be fine as I'm not doing SLI. Please suggest something of good quality?


Memory
Probably just 2 gigs of DDR2 800 from Crucial or Corsair

Hard Drive
Western Digital 500Gig -- Dont' know to much about this...Let me know if there is something better and similar to this one.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6822136073


Any input is greatly appreciated......Thank You

If you check on the specifications for the mobo on that newegg link you can see it has onboard 8 channel audio. Before you go out and buy a sound card, see if onboard is enough to satisfy your ears(most of the time it is).

Antec 900 is the perfect case look on pricegrabber.com and I believe Egoodz.com (never used them before but will to order my 900) has the case for ~109 + tax and FREE shipping which is way better than the 140+ at newegg.

For the PSU 500w would do just fine imo. The best choice is the Corsair models of power supplies.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817139004
Theres a debate on modular vs non-modular psu's, and I prefer the non-mod, but its up to you and the price difference is ~20-30 bucks.

Memory is incredibly cheap these days. If you wanna spend ~$80 on memory you can grab 4 gigs of G.Skill(which is a respectable brand of memory) from new egg.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820231122

And finally the hard drive. Seagates 7200.11 500gb hardrive seems to be the hd of choice. For under $100 you get a quality hard drive that'll blow the WD outta the water
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 11%2b500gb

Thanks mlig911, good to know.

Anyone have anything on the Graphics Card Question:

"GPU
evga Geforce 8800gt
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814130318
Only question here is: Is it worth it to get the model with the AKIMBO dual slot cooling configuration? I am mainly conserned about noise and I am not doing SLI. "

8800GTS 512mb. Don't even ask why I'm recommending this lol. It's much better than an 8800GT and its cheaper that the AKIMBO model you chose. Win win situation?

So....is it correct that the 8800gts 512mb here:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814130337

will have better performance and be quieter than the 8800gt that i have listed above.

There isn't a big difference between 8000 GT and GTS. If you had the money to spend do it by all means but there isn't a big difference.

http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] ,1928.html

read the article above. It is a comparison of current graphic cards and cpu's.