If you play games often, especially popular modern FPS, then you are pretty much stuck with the X-Fi line of card, as they have the latest gaming oriented features (since they are the market leaders when it come to PC consumer level sound card- I'll spare you what I think of their business practice though).
Here is their line of products:
The Xtreme Music is a very good buy for someone looking for an all-round affordable sound card (£70). It works well with multimedia speakers, and if you can always hook it to an external DAC and amp later on for pure music listenning since it support bit-perfect digital output. Used this way, it would be better than most stand alone soundcard (though very significantly more expensive). If the cost is still too high, you can hunt for the OEM version of this card, which comes without the plated connectors (not a huge deal really). If you look hard enough, you might be able to snatch one for a lil over £50.
The Platinum version is basically the Xtreme Music with a front bay. If you really think you need it, then by all mean.
The Fatal1ty version.. It's basically the Platinum version with an added 62MB of X-RAM. I queston it's value, and am even inclined to say that it is the worse buy of the lot (my opinion only, I am sure a lot of gamers bought it and are happy with it).
The Elite Pro version? Not as often mentioned, it is not a Fatal1ty version with a break out box. The Elite Pro version is the only card which carries a different op-amp & DAC compared to the base card (Xtreme Music). This will have benefit for your speakers, but also for your headphones.. assuming, if they are not low end. At £175+, you better make sure the rest of the gear is on par.
The Elite Pro is really quite similar to the EMU 1212 line of card (those are generally classified a step up from the M-Audio/Envy24 based card and a fairly frequent choice for audiophile), but with the benefit of the X-Fi gaming support. Still overpriced (EMU 1212 can be had for over £50 less), but you probably won't be able to get anything more versatile in one card. It won't be as good as an Xtreme Music + DAC + Amp combo, but then again... It is actually quite a bit cheaper (especially given the cost to get a good DAC in the UK).
There are better cards than the X-Fi Elite Pro, but you are then looking at > £200 for cards with less gaming support.
