Who said you get what you pay for? Absolutely correct. In the case of monitoring in 5.1 capable hardware, there is no shortcut or cheaper way, believe me, I tried.
In the past few days I've been through a Muse 5.1, SB Extigy, and SB Audigy 2. The only one that pretended to work was the Audigy 2...and it had major problems with freezing and stuttering audio during playback. And I tried EVERYTHING the tech support guy said to try and NOTHING WORKED!!! So the Audigy 2 got returned as well.
The only card I haven't tried that should work is the Turtle Beach Santa Cruz. That would be next in line if it weren't for the fact that I'm completely TIRED of trying to get these sub-par rigs to work.
That said, I'm ordering an M-Audio Delta 410 from musiciansfriend.com for $199, free shipping. From everything I've read here, this should be a hassle-free instalation and should work very well. It's also well priced if you ask me...
I hope it works!
Thanks to everyone who put their two cents in on what to buy.
In the past few days I've been through a Muse 5.1, SB Extigy, and SB Audigy 2. The only one that pretended to work was the Audigy 2...and it had major problems with freezing and stuttering audio during playback. And I tried EVERYTHING the tech support guy said to try and NOTHING WORKED!!! So the Audigy 2 got returned as well.
The only card I haven't tried that should work is the Turtle Beach Santa Cruz. That would be next in line if it weren't for the fact that I'm completely TIRED of trying to get these sub-par rigs to work.
That said, I'm ordering an M-Audio Delta 410 from musiciansfriend.com for $199, free shipping. From everything I've read here, this should be a hassle-free instalation and should work very well. It's also well priced if you ask me...
I hope it works!
Thanks to everyone who put their two cents in on what to buy.