Forgive my attention to detail lol.

My PC is a home built Intel Core2Duo
Antec 550w PSU
Intel Mobo
160 GB SATA Hard drive
40 GB IDE Hard drive (w/external as well)
3GB RAM
SB Audigy 4 PCI Sound Card
Radeon X1600 PCI-E Video Card
Currently have keyboard and mouse on USB along with my USB interface. Total of 3 USB ports being used.
Windows XP SP2 tweaked for optimum processor performance (such as unneeded services and background programs disabled etc.)

Using M-Audio Fast Track Pro USB interface with an SM57 in the left XLR channel. Using Ableton Live 6 Demo (Just to see if I like it, I have the full version of 5 in the packaging still).

First a couple of questions: I can see the ASIO driver available in Ableton and have selected that to use as my device. However, when I do that, I can no longer monitor my playing through my computer speakers which are hooked into my PCI sound card OR hear the test tone (for those experienced with Ableton). From previous research I read that if you are going to use ASIO, one must use the output on the USB interface to monitor playback and live monitoring. Is this my only problem?
(Note: In Control Panel>Sounds menu, i have tried using playback device as my Audigy 4, and also the Fast Track pro, none from either one).

Also, is it normal to have to record in mono? I have to change my track to the left channel only to get sound from both speakers.

Other than that, I think I can work out the latency kinks once I figure out monitoring and playback.

Would appreciate any replies, tips, feedback. Thanks in advance
:D