Bose Speakers

Right in the sweet zone. There are less expensive and much more costly.
Asus Xonar DX PCIe 7.1 Sound Card XONAR-DX at TigerDirect

Maybe this would be better?
Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer PCI Sound Card 70SB073A00000 at TigerDirect

mickey megabyte said:

i would recommend getting a dedicated sound-card before speakers.

what do others think?

This. Get a sound card like mine : the HT|Omega Claro. It's maybe 169$, but it's worth it. If you use headphones, get the Claro+ that has enhanced features for headphones + all the things from normal Claro. Avoid Crapative (read : Creative) products because simply, the drivers support is horrible and sound qualité is inferior. The only thing about HT|Omega is that it uses a PCI port compared for a PCI-Express x1 for Crapative.

Speakers, I really can't say... never had 5.1 or 7.1 sets... only Stereos (2 speakers; 2.1 speakers). But Stereo-wise, the current set of Eagle Arion I have is pretty good except that... they have a high failure rate within' the warranty period. In other words, I'm pretty sure you'll have to send them in at least once for exchange during the 1 year warranty.

@pparks1 Thanks for those great links about Bose. Reputation +1.

Not so! But to each their own, I run mine optical out into a separate DAC and it's quite nice. Sound quality is paramount for me and gaming noise is not so much. Your mileage may vary!

linnemeyerhere said:

Not so! But to each their own, I run mine optical out into a separate DAC and it's quite nice. Sound quality is paramount for me and gaming noise is not so much. Your mileage may vary!

If you do that, is it accurate to say that you are bypassing the sound card, since the output you hear comes from that outboard DAC?

There was no on board optical. And I still run my monitor speakers with it and some 900 mhz wireless speakers.