Ah, well this is news to me! Thanks for the answer guys!
As for the sound card itself, it also never occured to me that Creative was so overrated. Yes, I realized when they included the '
Fatal1ty sig with the card I knew this was a big marketing ploy. But I've always used Creative cards in my systems and found my last one of 6 years finally go out on me yesterday. (Funny story with that I can divulge later). It was (what I think) Creative's first card in their XFi series, and has all the features a lot of their cards do today (not to mention I shelled out the money for it then too!). It ran my 6.1 surround sound flawlessly.
But I digress, I have no problem looking into that Asus card you make mention of larchy; It's lunch break at work, and I can't be seen looking over these tech sites too often

I'll check it out when I get off!
@ haymaker: why would you want two sound cards? All I can imaging is using one to control one set of speakers or headphones and another for just speakers?
[EDIT]: I just re-read your post haymaker. The drivers allow you to pair up cards ala SLI Crossfire type technology (except without the bridge) to get double the processing power?
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