Sound Card + HDD

I'm thinking of getting these:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/show [...] 11&subcat=

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/show [...] ubcat=1279

Are each of them worth the money? Will my motherboard (Gigabyte GA P35C DS3R) support the sound card?

I have a little extra cash I could be willing to part with but only if it worth every penny. Essentially I want something that does the job, but that doesn't make me want to simply upgrade again months down the line.

I am currently using omboard sound and a WD 250GB 16MB Cache HDD. I am in need of more space so I am getting a large capacity HDD, but I'm not sure whether or not to get either 32MB or 64MB or either 1TB or 1.5TB. The extra money from downgrading the HDD can go towards getting a better sound card IF, it's worth the tradeoff.

So for the equivalent price: £108 (with some leeway if necessary) what can I do better?

Also what will OEM mean in regards to those two purchases?

FYI: Your links didn't work as planned. They both took me to the site's main page.

As far as sound cards go, I used to be big into Creative Audigy cards and such. But to be quite frank, my hearing isn't perfect anyhow. And since I don't have high end speakers, there's absolutely no difference for me. The on-board sound built into most motherboards these days (even like your P35 board) is pretty decent. I wouldn't waste the money to be honest.

As far as hard drives go. I'm not so sure there's going to be a large difference between the 32MB or 64MB caches (though that depends on what you're doing with the drive). Get a good quality hard drive though. Seagate and Western Digital tend to be pretty good drives these days (now that Seagate fixed their 1TB drive problems several months back).

I like to stay away from other brands, including Maxtor, specifically because they tend to be noisy. Western Digital drives have been my absolute favorite over the years. Always quiet, and reliable.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/show [...] =HD-325-WD

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/show [...] 11&subcat=

Here's what I was planning on getting. Turns out you picked out the same HDD

If I bring the HDD down to a 32MB and put some more cash down on upping the SC I could get this: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/show [...] 11&subcat=

or this: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/show [...] 11&subcat=

If it's worth it anyway. You say you didn't notice the difference, but wouldn't that change depending on the card itself? Or did you use high end cards?

Would either of the newer ones justify a sound card, or would I have to go higher.

FYI, the 'X-Fi' Xtreme Audio is virtually identical to the Audigy SE.
They both have the same non X-Fi chipset and I would not recommend either.

The Xonar DS is a good value choice, the Xonar D1 would be a better choice for not much more.
It will give you top notch sound quality and much better driver support than Creative is willing to offer.

For me it was quite the opposite.
I could hear a massive increase in sound quality going from onboard to an old X-Fi Gamer and another large increase going from that to a Xonar Dx (the PCIe version of the D1), even with shitty speakers.
IMHO, the Audigy series cards offer little in terms of quality over your basic onboard codec.
Perhaps you should see if any of your friends have a decent soundcard and listen to it before you make your decision.
Not everyone is able to tell the difference between good and bad sound...

EAX is not very relevant in newer games.
With the release of Vista, Microsoft replaced its audio stack with a Universal Audio Architecture which completely bypasses all EAX processing.
As such, most developers are no longer coding support for EAX.
It is only possible to use EAX features in older games by using a software wrapper that bypasses the UAA and mediates directly between the sound card and software.

All that aside, every card in the Xonar series supports EAX 2.0 in hardware and EAX 5.0 through emulation.
The SB Audigy SE (and X-Fi Xtreme Audio) has NO hardware EAX support, only supporting EAX 4.0 through emulation.
In fact, many of Creative's offerings only support EAX Emulation.
If it is an onboard codec or comes bundled with the motherboard, odds are it only has emulated EAX support.

The biggest difference in regards to EAX between these cards is how the emulation is handled.

ASUS integrates the emulation feature into their standard driver package and you need only push a single button in it's control panel to activate it.
One click and it simply works.

Creative, on the other hand, requires you to install and configure a second piece of software, Creative ALchemy.
Each game you wish to use EAX processing with must be manually Added and Configured.
In some cases you may even need to over wright some files in the games directory to get it working properly.