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Thread USB/firewire or PCI card?

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1 USB/firewire or PCI card?
I'm a little confused about which kind of hardware I should use to convert analog to Digital into my PC.

I'm looking to record guitar, bass, vocals and midi - all tracks individually - into my my Althlon XP 3200 based desktop with 1024 MB RAM running Windows XP. It has both USB 2 and Firewire ports.

I purposely didn't buy a sound card yet, waiting to see what the recording dependencies might be.

I'm recording for fun, but assuming al things go well, might look to do something a little higher quality

So what is the difference between USB/Firewire and PCI based products?

I looked at USB boxes like the Tascam US122 Audio/MIDI Interface, the MAudio Firewire 410 Mobile Recording Interface.

I've also seen PCI cards like Echo Mia MIDI PC Digital Audio Interface and the RME HDSP 9632 Hammerfall DSP 24/96 Audio PCI card.

And then I've seen the PCI cards with the breakout boxes like the MAudio Delta 66 Audio Interface.

So what is the difference between them - besides the obvious differences like number of inputs/outputs and cost.

I do not have a preamp for the mics, so will I need phantom power and do most of these types of products have them?

With the USB/Firewire box only, do I need a seperate soundcard?

Does anyone have any recommendations

Thanks in advance.
2
I am using a Tascam US-224, and am very pleased with the results. I would definitely recommend adding good mic pre's. I've heard great things about the Studio projects VTB-1, but any mic pre will make a great difference. Check out the Mbox. It comes with 2 focusrite mic pre's built in and gets you into Pro Tools. It only has 2 in/ 2 out though, and I don't know if that's enough for you.

The problem with USB initially was the ammount of data that could be transferred. It is nice, however to be able to "hot swap" the connections. Its was limited to 4 in/ 4 out of simultanious audio. USB 2 has changed that and new products like one from Edirol are upping that considerably. Firewire has always had more I/O.