i am a guitar player who wants to turn his pc into a home studio. what i need to know is what i need to get started. i have cakewalk, sound forge, cubase and a couple other programs like this. my computer has 128 of ram and a 13 g hard drive and its a pent3 450 mhz. i think this setup will work, with mayber a little more memory and a bigger hard drive. i am realy focusing on soundcards. when i go to musicians friend or mars, i see the cards and then the boxes with all the inputs on them that connect to them. my questions are: what are those boxes with all the inputs for? whats the difference between stock soundcards and the ones that i see on the sites? can i just use my stock card and get a couple midi cables and adapters? what are some things to look for in a good sound card? is the creative sound 5.1 live comparable to any of the actual recording cards? how is the best way to actually get the sound in the computer(except via an effects proccesor)? price is a bit of a concern as always, i am not expecting a studio quality, just a decent demo type setup.