Have you thought about using tools and materials that you already have, instead of paying for new gear? That way, if you're not satisfied, yuo can still go out and buy the gear, but you may also be surprised by the results.

I have had some success using just my trusty old Pentium I 166 (souped up with 256 RAM, mind you) and a demo version of Acid Pro 2.0. It takes a bit of tinkering to get completely used to it, and you can only record 8 tracks in the demo version, there are absolutely no effects (not even fade in/out, volume level increase/decrease). However, I've just recently discovered GoldWave, and I think that the two programs combined can be very powerful.

Just a thought...

You can find Acid Pro around the 'net, but beware, my friend recently downloaded version 3.0, and it doesn't allow you to record tracks longer than 2 mins., whereas version 2.0 allows you to record as long as you have hard drive space/RAM. I'm not sure if you can find v2.0 around (I had already downloaded it about a year ago, when it was brand new).

Hope that helps.