I'm going to disagree here, and then respectfully bow out.
In the long run, the quality of the converters is going to have the greatest impact on your sound. All of the "might need" features should be secondary.
A recent Toms Hardware sums up Creatives BS marketing:
"Unlike the DMX 6Fire 24/96, the Audigy Platinum is not a "true" 24/96 and cannot play or record a file of this quality, nor even work on it. Actually, the only task it does in 96 kHz is a linkup with another device via the S/PDIF input. The card and rack components are all supposed to be 24-bit/ 96-kHz-compatible, but, in practice, the card is limited to 16 bits/ 48 kHz. Analog recording and restitution is possible in 24 bits/ 48 kHz, but, in fact, the processor downsamples in 16 bits and then upsamples. The card also has to be used with the sample rate conversion (SRC) software provided in order to work in 44.1 kHz. It's just a pity that Creative has not given this product an automatic SRC hardware option by using, say, a Cirrus Logic CS8420 chip. And it's really a pity that the card is not completely 24-bit/ 96-kHz-compatible. But the Audigy can model, process and position several sound sources separately and in real time. "
Yes the audigy has built in firewire, but notice they call it SB1394 and they have a list of "SB1394 compatible" firewire devices. This just screams back to the old days when creative was putting shitty IDE controllers on thier soundcards and pumping out CDROM drives that did meet ATAPI specs. Now that's just me whining, I'm not saying that for a fact that the firewire support isn't any good...I just don't trust creative anymore than I trust HP or Compaq anymore. (I did see a review where the SB was several MB slower than a firewire card, but reviews are relative) Oh, did I mention that SB1394 only works on Win98SE?
At any rate, if you purchase the Audigy you're purchasing a soundblaster, no if's and's or but's about it. The card is primarily focused on gaming and entry level "musicians". You can find the card at your local Staples, and it'll come in a sweet looking box loaded with buzzwords and inside will be all sorts of bundled "limited edition" software and maybe even a couple games. In the end, however, you can expect soundblaster quality recording.
Is the quality of a soundblaster that bad? No, in fact if you have to have a consumer soundcard, a soundblaster is the way to go. In fact, I'm thinking about snagging an SB Live! Value myself for soundfont support. HOWEVER, the audigy is not a cheap card. Even the entry level versions at $50....you're only $100 short of the cost of an m-Audio Audiophile which not only supports real numbers, but will simply SOUND better. And that's what it's all about, right?
If I were you, I'd use your existing soundcard, which might not sound too bad, until you can save up an extra 100 bucks. Now I know exactly what it's like to be cheap, because I'm really cheap too. But we're not quite into the threshold of pain here just yet. The difference between $50 and $150 isn't as big as the difference between, for instance, $300 and $400 according to my cheapskate manual here.
If you can save up to $230-250 you can grab a Delta44 which has a nice little breakout box that makes life a lot easier, and it has 4 ins and 4 outs. Once you get into computer recording and you toss out your tape machine (ok maybe you won't, but most people do), those extra inputs come in handy for sure.
So, to sum up: it is my opinion, as a cheapskate, that sound quality is most important when recording. The jump from high end consumer cards like the Audigy to low end prosumer cards like the Audiphile or Delta44 is a lot smaller than the jump from low end prosumer to high end prosumer/professional. The biggest bang for the buck in terms of sound quality will be found in the low end offerings from m-Audio, Echo, and similar companies.
Slackmaster 2000
I'm going to bow out now because I don't want to turn your first buying experience into a big debate. I certainly don't want there to be any sour vibes between us either.