in my own opinion the VIA 6421 PCI SATA CARD is the one, its the one i use and i have had no problems with it.
as for your questions about the dvd drive, that mostly depends on you.
if you go sata just plug it in a empty sata port on the mdoard,
if you go with ide there is or should be a extra spot on the cable that your cd drive is connected to.
as for the external drive, myself i would stay away from that if you can, there are alot of people useing them with laptops but if you have a empty bay in your pc go internal.
if you go sata i wouldnt use the sata card, use the on board sata.
something you may not know, you say you have a cd drive currently in you pc, if its just a cd drive and not a dvd dual layer burner you will need one as the samsung kreon flashed drive will not burn games, it just reads the game, you need the burner to make the backup.
hope this helps.
Fudpucker,
I was able to get a refund from Newegg on the PCI SATA card. I wanted to get the one that you were talking about because I like the idea of having an external plug. Then I noticed that all the "Green" ones listed were coming from China and shipping would take 2-3 weeks. Ouch!!! Too Long...
Then I noticed this one was out in Texas. Would you mind giving it a look and tell me if you think it would work. It has the right chipset, it has the PCI SATA but it also has an "eSATA" What the heck is that? Is it a regular SATA only with a "E" for Exteranl???
eSata + SATA + IDE PCI Controller Card VIA VT6421A
