My old XP 2600+ was installed on an identical asus mb and I used soundstorm exclusively with no hiss, no problems of any kind in any game including SH3.
I also use the onboard audio (ALC850 7.1) on my new board with same results. The mantra that onboard audio is "crap" is no longer necessarily true as its come along way beginning with Soundstorm. In fact, the only audio problems I ever had was the well known (though not to me until later) conflict between my SB Live and Via chipset on my old Intel box which resulted in hiss, stuttering, and other assorted glitches. That drove me nuts and I've never bought a SB since (it being the only card to have this problem which Creative, at least while I owned it, never did address... that was also my last VIA board too so the experience cost both companies at least one customer as it was not unique to me).
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