Audio Cassette to PC recording

I have a dual cassette player I wanted to transfer some audio speaking tapes and music tapes to my PC then record to a CD. or DVD.

Would the audio format be a .MP3?

Would I need a special Sound card in my PCI slot for the RCA cords,or adapter from RCA to 1/8" (to sound card).

This Cassette player also has a Receiver that plugs into it..Could I only use the cassette player w/o the reciever..in other words, will the sound from the cassette player go directly into the PC without the help of the receiver?
Or do I need the reciever to play with the audio treble, bass, balance?
I have four inputs on Sound card which is a C-Media CMI8738/C3DX PCI
Audio Device.....
...a Line-in,(using my speakers) Line out, Mic-in, and one more I can't read on the card.

Thanks for any help!

See attached pic for details on using the reciever so you can monitor the music through your stereo speakers while you record. You could also just plug the output from the cassette deck directly into the sound card and monitor via the PC speakers if you want. Both methods will work equally well.

Use a stereo RCA to Stereo Mini (1/8) cable to plug the tape out from the reciever to the line in on the sound card.

cable example...

http://ostg.pricegrabber.com/info_pi...sterid=8112110

Both of those methods will be a constant level signal... the recievers volume and bass/treble controls will not effect the recording.

Then you'll need a program to capture the audio signal and record it onto the drive.

Audacity is a good one and it's free.

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

It will allow you to record/save it as an MP3 which will be good quality and small file size (opposed to .wav which would be a very large file)

its a good idea to save as wav's first, because its quicker (because of the time taken to code mp3s) then use a batch convert progs, such as ogg converter, to mp3 them afterwards if you want to keep them small on your hard drive. Make the audio cds from the wav files because a) better quality and b) quicker - if they're mp3s your burning software will need to convert them to cda which is close to wav.
you'll find lots of info here www.br0wn.co.uk/vinyltocd.htm