The X-Mystique 7.1 Dolby Digital Live sound card is finally available from US retailers: iocombo and bluebonepc. ($99) This product is unique in that it outputs your computer's sound, including 3d sound from games, as a Dolby Digital bitstream—so you can get full surround sound through your home theater system. This is what you need if you have a 5.1 speaker system and DD decoder hooked up to your computer. (Otherwise, if you want true multichannel surround sound for games, you need to run multiple analog signal cables from your computer to an amp with multiple inputs. Yuck.)

Previously, this type of sound system was only available in some versions of nVidia's nForce 2 chipset. "SoundStorm" was fantastic, but was ultimately dropped from the nForce chipset, leaving many of us out in the cold.

Check out the X-Mystique review at nV News for more info. There are also discussions at nV News, AVS Forum, and 3d Sound Surge. Note that the drivers are still a little rough, and ASIO is not implemented yet--though it is supposedly coming. If you get it one, you are definitely an early adopter. Caveat emptor.