Serge,

can you comment more on Audacity?
I have seen that it's free, so maybe it offers less choices compared with commercial DAWs like Cubase or Sonar?

How you record your music depends on what you want to achieve. A quick, built-in recorder in your arranger does a great job of capturing a 'Live' recording, warts and all. As long as you check your levels, maybe take a peek at the waveform display in an audio editor (Audacity makes a good free one) and check that you never exceed 0db (look for 'flat line' in the loud sections), you are good to go. Then all it is is down to you... Balance it in advance. Mind you, that one thing seems to elude most of us...

If you want to take things further... sky's the limit. Record the arranger Parts as a MIDI capture, edit the heck out of them, record them one by one into your computer as audio, or replace them with better VSTi's or other keyboards, play real guitar (or hire a pro), 'comp' your vocals, use a tad of Auto-tune, fly in audio loops...

It all depends on how far you want to take it.

Beachbum,

I have done a lot of research and the RME sound cards seem to be indeed among the very best in the market. You adviced the HDSP 9632, but I would rather prefer an external solution, should I in the future change PC (and motherboard). Do you have any experience of the RME Fireface UC?

RME Fireface UC

Also, what Heath and Allen mixer are you using?
Thanks.

Although the RME cards are definitely some of the very best in the business (along with Apogee and Metric Halo, UAD etc.), they are also some of the more expensive.

I would honestly advise that, unless you are doing professional work that demands the very highest standards, you can do VERY acceptable work with audio cards a lot less expensive.

Like the Tascam US 144 I currently have?

Or maybe like the Focusrite Scarlet 18i8?

The Focusrite costs less than half the price of an RME Fireface UC