I hate to be negative but I have some issues with most of the gear you have mentioned. I will also try to be constructive by offering some alternatives for the pieces you mentioned. Keep in mind that my opinions are just that and other folks my not agree with my assessments. It is well known I have a definite bias towards higher end gear ...

Motu 896 HD and Tascam 2400 control surface or Tascam FW 1884 with two 8 channel expanders.

I like the Tascam products. Good build quality, lasts forever and decent sound at it's price point. I have never heard a really bad piece of gear from Tascam and some of their things sound really good to me ... I still have pieces of Tascam gear from the 70's that work perfectly.

MOTU is better suited to a Mac computer... not so great on PCs. The converters on the MOTU stuff are pretty "bottom of the barrel". I do not recommended MOTU ... It is attractive though ...

AKG Drum Set Big which consists of a D112, four C418PH and two C1000s.

I love how AKG has packaged two good mics with one crappy one in this drum package. You will do better by getting the D112 on its own and the purchasing some SM57's or Audio Technica Pro 35x clip ons for the snare and toms and a pair of Studio Projects C4 for overheads ... The C1000's are unmitigated crap ... The C418's in comparison to the Audio Technica Pro35x's, have a higher boost in the treble regions and a more drastic roll off in the lows ... in short the Pro35x has more lows and a smoother hi freq response. I use these all the time on snare and toms and I love them. great for horns and on Leslie cabs as well ..

AKG 3000B or Rode NT-2000

Neither one of these mics have been very well received. I would suggest the Studio Projects C1 or C3 in place of either of them. Studio Projects makes some of the only price conscious mics that I recommend. At first i could not believe that they could make a product that sounded good and stood up to repeated use in the studio for what SP charges. They sent me a collection of their products and after extended use I have changed my opinion regarding these mics. Their entire mic line represents great value and performs well.

Presonus Blue Tube for the preamp tube

One word .... BARF! Do you want a tube pre? Sebatron is the only manufacturer that is making real, all tube, transformer balanced, high current tube mic pres with a real power supply (not a wall wart) that are affordable.. Yes they are much more expensive than the budget offerings but they simply sound waaaaay better! If you don't want to fork out for the good stuff, don't fool yourself into thinking that something in the mid price range is going to even approach the quality of a high end pre or be substantially better than the pres you have in your Behringer.. It's all subjective and some might say they have realized large improvements with mid grade pres but I personally think it is more a case of placebo effect taking hold in these cases. I personally remain unconvinced.

Presonus Blue Max for compression

Deja' Vu' .... Inexpensive, good comps are difficult to find. The best you can do in this area is to stick with the DBX stuff .... I am still trying to find a great sounding affordable comp to suggest to people when asked. I haven't heard one yet. Perhaps someone might clue me in on one? (not the RNC please)

You will only need to compress a bit going into the DAW and once you are in the box you can compress to taste with plug ins ...

many thanks for your response cedar flat fats!!!

i've been checking out a lot of sites and i'm thinking of seeing other things...

do you know any good card that has 8 adat at 24/96?
i've seen great reviews of the e-mu 1820m but it only has 4 channels adat at 24/96... do you know any that has 8?

what do you think of the new rme fireface 800?
it seems a great peace of gear doesn't?

thks again

inLoco wrote: many thanks for your response cedar flat fats!!!

i've been checking out a lot of sites and i'm thinking of seeing other things...

do you know any good card that has 8 adat at 24/96?
i've seen great reviews of the e-mu 1820m but it only has 4 channels adat at 24/96... do you know any that has 8?

what do you think of the new rme fireface 800?
it seems a great peace of gear doesn't?

thks again

it's my understading that due to the bandwidth of the optical cable ADAT can only transmit 4 channels at 96k. However, you can tarnsmit 8 channels at 44.1 or 48khz. Is there a particular reason why you want to be at 96k anyway? I'm still using 48khz RME converters and they are all I would ever need (until DVD audio becomes an affordable and prominent medium I'll certainly stick with them). Remember, with 96k you use twice the DSP power and twice the hard drive space as well- something I'm certainly not ready to give up.

I know many people may disagree with me on this, but I don't use a controller to mix, in fact I've gotten quite used to working without one. It might make more sense to save that money now and throw it into your pres. As for a compressor, I have 4 channels of compressor in my rack that never get used anymore. It's just not necessary for my application, and it may not be for yours either. I compress everything in the box with plugins. The only reason I could think of for wanting an outboard compressor (at the stage of home recording you're at) would be for noise shaping and I doubt you will find anything at the low price point that will make that process worth while. think long and hard and make distinctions about what you want and NEED.

Personally, I would say go with the DIGI 002 rack,. just because I really like Pro Tools software and find it intuitive and great for editing audio (even though I bitch about it's MIDI capabilities sometimes). While Kurt is right about the AKG drum mic kit being a crappy gimmick, there is a mic kit that is a good deal- the high end shure kit (not the pg kit or whatever) it comes with a beta 52 and three sm57's- can't go wrong with that- it's a pretty versatile offering.

I took Kurt's recommendations and got the studio projects c4's for overheads- couldn't be happier. I had the pleasure to demo a set of studio projects c3's as well, and they were also very impressive mics. Might also want to check out the BLUE baby bottle and the shure ksm-44- haven't used either personally but I have friends who own both and their recordings sound great and they swear by them.

thks for you response bhennies

i too don't use a control surface or mixing desk when i'm mixing or recording with cool edit pro... but it's one thing i think it lacks in my studio... i like to feel the touch of the faders and i know the way i mix i take at least twice the time...

the reason i'd like to have 24/96 is simply because of the future! it's a way to don't get so behind... if me and my band have sucess and i'm able to buy more stuff to make a very good studio, i'd like to have things that don't need to be changed...

the rme fireface 800 says it has
Input Digital: 2 x ADAT optical or SPDIF optical, SPDIF coaxial (AES/EBU compatible)

does this mean i can have 8 line ins from adat at 24/96?
one more thing (i know i'm being bored but i don't want to make a big mistake...) for recording vocals and acoustic guitar is good to have a tube pre-amp right? what tube pre-amps can i have (new!no ebays please) that are less that 1000$?

many thanks for your answers