Ah, thanks for reminding me how simple it is to get 5.1. When sound involves speakers instead of headphones, I always worry it'll be really complex.

My Audigy probably does 5.1. If not, I'm sure I can get a cheap oem "Audigy 6 gold 5.1 THX" etc etc. Throw in some simple 5.1 speakers and I can determine if a full blown 5.1 setup is really worth it. Thanks!

Positional audio as pie in the sky? Not at all. People have been working on true positional audio for decades. A friend of mine digs deep into the geek researcher labs and finds all the goods. It's out there, at the end of some deep Google searches. I'll try to get some good links from his knowledge base.