Advice requested for these products and any suggestions; Links below

[mordy]

The advise so far not to buy Cheap components is very sound advise learnt the hard way in somes cases.!! . . So taking this route Will save you money in long run BUT better still if possible is to buy local for support. So With you being in Aus then i'd recommend speaking with Peter Homann and buying a Gecko G540 from him. This is a very nice all in one board that will easily do what you want. Peter Knows is stuff and doesn't sell Rubbish.
http://www.homanndesigns.com/store/

Don't cut corners it's really not worth the hassle.!

Wow That' awesome, I spoke to Peter this morning, he is a great guy, very helpful and he has the stuff I need at a good price, I decide on the Gecko G540 as you and he suggested, looks really nice, I am very happy. Also he is just 5 min drive from my house.

Now the only thing is the parallel port issue, I'll have to do a bit more research on that to explore the options, as the smooth stepper or UC100 are going to add $200+ to the build.

I hear what you say regarding the PC and interruptions etc, Ideally I would love the MACH3 on my Macbook Pro under parallels (emulation or virtual PC) using the USB and assigning it all resources when running, but I need to see what others are doing, and if they are being successful.

I am open to more suggestions on that, Thanks so much to all.