LinuxQuestions.org - Choosing a High-End sound card with Linux support

Hey folks,

When i was specing out my new pc i ended up with a motherboard that (along with it's other funky features) came with an onboard sound card,

That era has now passed, its time to move on, to greater, louder, clearer things; namely me watching movies now that i've ironed out the misunderstanding me and my dvd drive were having.

looked around at whats available and settled on something with a remote and an external I/O box (maybe even a drive bay one) (one of the creative X-fi's, though they look eXey, or maybe one of the creative Audigy 2's.. ZS platinum pro)

However, looked around creatives website and it seems they dont have linux driver support,

Main question, do i have my noob glasses on and missing something? or do they not support linux and does linux support them (those two i mentioned at least, and if not those two, any others from creative with similar features, optical out+7.1 capable, thx would be nice)

and if "No", to all of the above, then are there any high-end sound cards, with all the gaming and movie (editing and recording doesnt really interest me, but it seems that sound cards with all the top end listening features come with these standard) features one could need, and maybe a few extra i might need later, that i can get working seemlessly and to use all its capabilities?

Thanks for the time spent reading&answering this

Andrew
--
Noobver01

P.S. would still like to change my profile so i have full system details to assist any potential Answerer who might be in need of a little hardware/software context, edited my last post asking for info on how to do this, but have no responses yet, thanks again