The Sound Solution...

Greetings, Gang.
This is hopelessly premature, but I think I've stumbled upon THE recording solution of my dreams (est. some 20 years ago).
Digital recording has essentially been around that long, but devices have certainly been on the scene in the last 6 years that make most of my recent efforts redundant/rediculous. In my humble opinion, the following is THE ideal solution to 90% of needs I've encountered for sound:
1. PC running XP ~ 300
2. Alesis 8 channel direct USB mixer ~150
3. Decent mic (I'm using a Shure Beta') ~ 125
4. cables ~ 12
5. Adobe Audition (using an old, slimmed down version)... but wondering if (freeware) Audacity can do most of the reads... ~100
6. I run guitar sounds from my Ibanez ICX guitar through a Roland CUBE 30, and mike it (line-outs appear to be a conspiracy to drive people like me crazy... )
7. I use a freeware drum machine for placeholder percussion and other sounds.

I don't have it together yet, but it appears that multi-tracking is capable through the USB assignments in Audition. KFA.
AMAZING output... solutions I didn't think were possible... and very affordable. Don't know what else to say other than "wish I had this 5 years ago..." - k