In the old setup I had a Turtle Beach Santa Cruz which I have had since like 2004ish - it rocked!
I had some cheap RCA<>3.5mm cable which I then replaced with some TechLink interconnect cable (same format but much more expensive) I got through a guy I met at work who used to be able to get audio gear at trade prices.
I also got the stereo receiver off him for £35 back in 2004, it's a great piece of kit and sounds better than newer equivalent models/brands I have attempted to
upgrade to a few times.
Now I have an X-Fi Gamer as I needed more punch in games, thankfully the music and movie sound quality seems to be unchanged over the Santa Cruz and I really like the XFi as I was dreading the return to Creative soundcards after having a few bad experiences with the Soundblaster range before the Santa Cruz.
I'll get a new receiver eventually though as I want to use optical out instead of analogue as I've been told it's less prone to interference and sends out a cleaner signal so the next step up will be that I reckon. No plans to go surround sound anytime soon, stereo is how I like it
P.S. my old speakers are up for grabsies ^_^