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Hey. Thats a pretty broad question :P. Firstly since you are on a laptop, automaticly your onboard sound chip should be considered a pos. A very good alternative and a new alternative actually is the Audigy 2 ZS Notebook. Its a PCMCIA card that nicely fits in a single PCMCIA slot and its well worth the cash if you are goign to be producing on a laptop  . As for MIDI controllers; theres a tendancy that the word 'cheap' and 'MIDI' never show up in the same sentence :P. There are some good cheapER solutions though (thats cheaper than most btw). Assuming you go all software, youll want a good set of controllers to control the softsynths.
Since youre once again stuck on a laptop, and since most laptops neglect to put the joystick port on there (which is also a midi in/out for those that didnt know), you need some way to use midi controllers. A great solution that is under $100 is the MIDIMan Uno which is a 1x1 controller. The 1x1 means that you have 1 in and 1 out which, no worries, that gives you 16 channels for your controllers. You can also move up to the 2x2 and get 32 channels (which I'd recomend but if youre being budget concious, dont bother ).
Now for some controllers to hook to your new USB<->MIDI interface. Anymore, these are hard to find but probably the best constructed slider controller I have ever used; the Peavey 1600 has 16 sliders on it that are all assigned to a seperate midi controller. Sometimes, but seemingly rarer everyday, you can find one on ebay. They also make a 1600x which allows you to change all the controller numbers for each slider and then save the patch in the built in memory or upload different patches off the net into the memory but thats not really needed unless your lazy or want to do live performances :P. I'll save you from having to look at several knob controllers because there is a decent replacement out for the Peavey 1600, the Behringer BCF2000. In my opinion, it isnt as well constructed and the sliders arent as smooth but its definantly worth the money for all it does. It has 8 knobs and 8 sliders and even one better, is the fact that the sliders are motorized . Also on the controller surface is 16 buttons as well as the ability to save and store patches.
Now for me, I dont need any fancy keyboard controllers, in fact I use a plain Quickshot MIDI Composer which works beautifully. It feels a lot like my dads juno 2. Unfortunately, they are pretty hard to find anymore. Its too bad too because they are pretty cheaply priced, have 76 keys, velocity sensitive and also has aftertouch (which probably wont mean much to you if you dont know much about MIDI ). Be on the lookout for one though because its very nicely made and well worth the price (around $100).
As for sounds; check the TA Synths of 2005 for all your softsynth needs . Personally, to make your money well spent, just focux on buying Native Instruments FM7, LinPlug Albino, and rgc:AUDIO z3ta+. There are some other good ones but these are definantly the best for the processor usage/price/sound quality ratio. You might check out some sample cds around the net as well. I could list those but they very so greatly in terms of sounds that I wont bother. Just go and search in Google.
Hope this helped get you started .
Cheers,
Zac
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DarkSword - Turn On
DarkSword - Hell Bound
DarkSword - Fresh
DarkSword - Styled
DarkSword - Shadowed Sun
DarkSword - Turning Forward
DarkSword - ALLFRUIT
Pacific Mint vs DarkSword - Climax Zone 2005
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---FL Studio 9 User---
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Producing
im looking into all the info you gave me, its all finaly starting to make sense 
