Good morning,

(my current setup:
AMD athlon XP 2400
512mb ram
40gb HD
Soundblaster (16bit 44.1khz)
Sonar 2.2
Standard MIDI keyboard
)

I have a dilema,

I want to include vocals in my projects, but I am on a budget.

I have seen some offerings by M-audio for around 100-150 (fast-track) that offer
an XLR in and pre-amp, and interface with my PC via USB, so there is no A to D conversion.
However when the audio is transfered, it is truncated to 24bit and 48kz. Since I eventually want to purchase a soundcard that supports 24bit 96khz audio, this pre-amp will eventually be inadequate.

My question is: which would be the lesser of 2 evils:
(Assume that I'm recording vocals on a good mic, the soundcard supports 24bit 96khz audio, and ideal environmental condictions)
1. recording vocals through a good anologue mixer, into the analouge input on my soundcard.
2. recording vocals through a usb pre-amp that turncates the audio format from analouge to 24bit 48khz audio

So, if anyone has any helpful advice, please let me know!

--Joshua