I have seen this little thing for a while, what the freak makes it better than the normal outputs on my laptop?
http://www.creative.com/products/product.asp?category=244&subcategory=250&product=10769 The AD ( Analog to digital ) converter and DA (digital do analog) converter. Any input must pass from the AD to be stored and recognised by the computer. Any output must pass from the DA to convert all the digital bits to analog sound to be recognised by humans.
AD and DA are expensive so more expensive sound cards have better AD and DA.
err what? That was extremely rude...
Haramanai is completely right, what you're paying for is the ADC\DAC... although soundblaster cards aren't exactly pro quality in that department...
The 104db SNR is a vast improvement on your normal laptop inputs - which will certainly be noisy as hell! Not to mention the 24\192 depth\resolution, where your average card has only 16\44...
TBH if you're only playing games & not doing any serious audio work, those features aren't exactly going to be that useful to you...
Just so you know, a pro audio device is probably not much more expensive that the Sound Blaster, depending on how many output and input channels you need and what you are using it for.
Also, I have been told that it is better to have an external device for audio than an internal card, so that the power is isolated from the PC fan noise. Of course, that is only really a concern if you are doing more pro-audio type stuff.