It is not a company most people have heard of, but BlueGear makes soundcards, and their newest is the HDA X-Mystique 7.1.  The cards are priced for someone on a budget, but do offer 7.1 and 5.1 Dolby Digital sound for those who don't want to pick up a Creative card.  Read the whole review at Penstar Systems.

"The sound card market is a very strange one these days. When Creative released the Sound Blaster

series computer sound really took off and there were quite a few solid competitors in the market

at that time. The big chip firms were Ensoniq, Creative, Cirrus Logic, Aureal and others.

Through the years though, due to market pressures, buyouts, and legal action we now have only

three major manufacturers of standalone sound chips. I am not simply talking audio codecs and the

integrated sound functionality on the chipset level, but true standalone sound chips that work

independently of the CPU. Creative just released their X-Fi series of chip which brings some

incredible DSP prowess to the table and continue to produce their Audigy 2 and SB Live! 24 chips.

VIA has carefully nursed their Envy series of chips to be a solid product for a wide range of

products from the average desktop to the recording studio. The last big audio chipmaker is

C-Media."

Here is some more Tech News from around the web:

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iPod @ A True Review

MP3 Player @ Hardware Zone

Professional Studio Monitor Speaker System Review @ Tweaknews.net

iPod Alarm Clock @ Deesigntechnica