Mark,
I also use an Audiophile 2496. That's 4 in -
4 out for about
$150-$175. Two analog and two s/pdif.
I could live with that. I do want S/PDIF for interfacing with my
external decoder, the SB on my Windows machine, and my MiniDisc
machine. Old-fashioned analog would be nice because I could connect
directly to my old-fashioned analog mixer.
But I don't see any Linux drivers for the 2496.