daw hardware

I've been looking around for alternatives to audio interfaces recently... and with the help of a few mentionable cats here i ran into a few of the Tascam hardware recorders...
such as...

I have an 24" iMac 2.8 core duo w/ 500 gig internal hard drive, 4gig's RAM and I currently have a PreSonus FireBox with some very old Cubase LE software that came with it - I never installed on the iMac yet(used on my PC for a few years now).

Question. Does anyone use anything such as an Adat, HD multitrack or a analog multitrack in conjuction with their favorate S/W. The reason I ask is because, I have an ADAT XT20 w/ less than 120 original head hrs.

There have been several threads going on around here forever about the virtues (or lack-thereof) of passing the signal through a compressor on the way into a software-based DAW (hard drive). I am not here to once again debate whether or not this is good idea, let's just say for the sake of argument in this thread, that it *is* a good idea.

So I was asked to bring my Delta 1010 based DAW to record a matrix mix of a show this weekend (stereo soundboard +stereo mics)

Hello.
I want to use Steinberger-NUENDO DAW software and I want to know what is the best PC Hardware with multiprocessors (2 to 4 Pentiun III)under Windows 2000 to use with it?
I intend to use more than 72 track and lots of plugins, inclusiv surround Dolkby and DTS encoding.

Best regards

Herminio Cerqueira