Hey all - I just want to get down to the black and white, sorta, of the sound world. I have a Sound Blaster Live! value at the moment with Klipsch THX certified 4.1 speakers. Two front, two rear, and a subwoofer.

Thing is, whenever I play with the volume control on my speakers I get static, and not all speakers will produce sound, so I'll play with the volume controls a little more and then all the speakers come on. It's weird. All the connections are nice and snug but it acts up like that, which annoys me to no end.

So I took a quick look on the net for reviews, went straight to the conclusions as I'm not really into signal to noise ratios and all that garbage - I'm not a professional, and I don't use my computer to power a serious Home Theater setup, so why bother getting that nitty-gritty. I DO wonder about sound quality though. I do things like play Dark Age of Camelot (sometimes), Half Life: Counter Strike, Battlefield 1942: Desert Combat, and every once in a while play Wolfenstein/Enemy Territory. Of course when Doom3 comes out I'll probably get it, maybe buy Ravenshield (Rainboxsix 3) soon - stuff of that nature.

Every once in a while I'll watch a DVD but as I just bought a 19" NEC monitor it's not exactly cinema ... quality... I mean.. it's a monitor - media always looks a little different, because it's not designed for that.. it's like comparing a console game to a high end PC with high resolution.. they just don't look quite right.. so again I'm not worried about spending $1000 on audio trying to replicate a quality home theatre setup.

So, the "black and white" part - with the titles listed above, would I gain *anything* at all in sound quality? Is my positional sounds going to be more consistent? Will I hear water droplettes falling as if into my very ear lobe? I mean, yea great new ATI graphics card, can do this, can do that, blah blah blah.. it's all theory.. I don't see any difference between my ATI Radeon 9700 PRO and my Geforce2 - maybe because until my NEC monitor shows up all I've used is a generic POS display, but whatever.

If I buy an Audigy2 Platinum to replace my Sound Blaster Live! value card, am I going to appreciate it, or is it going to be like throwing out a perfectly good apple and picking up the next perfectly good apple (fruit, not the system)?

The next question is, I believe the Audigy2 supports 6.1 and not 7.1 - I've seen reviews of 4.1 and 5.1 speaker setups.. so.. for $400.00 or less, what is THE best 6.1 (if that's all the Audigy supports - if it supports 7.1, then the best 7.1 for that price range) speaker setup you all have ever heard of/seen/read about, etc?

Basically if only a sound fanatic with a pained expression on their face as a result of the absolute level of concentration they're currently holding trying to determine the differences in sound qualtiy, having a hard time detecting those differences, having to play it again, and again, and again.. still can't make up their mind.. Let's have another listen ! - then I'm saving my money, because quite frankly up to this point I'm sorely disappointed with my new graphics card as it is. I don't even run high res because I don't have a 30" monitor, or perfect vision, so quite frankly running anything higher than 1024x768 is just out of the question for me anyway..

Now, if most of you think I can really appreciate the difference in fidelity, then please, let me know what speakers you recommend, and I'll just buy an Audigy2 Platinum to match up with my new speakers.


Oh, and one thing that is deffinite - I don't own a home stereo, so my computer IS used to play CDs and/or MP3s (which I no longer have, thanks to a crashed HDD last year)

Thanks all..sorry for the long winded question, but I want to be sure I'm clear.. I used to be all into performance, and blah blah blah.. but since those days I've come to appreciate having extra dough in my pockets, so if all this stuff would do is make my computer "look cool", then.. psh.. forget it.. but if the moment I plug it in and I can actually hear the difference in say.. Pink Floyd.. then bring it on!