If you are planning on doing work on your own machine, you will want to have these basics:

1) A basic sound editor.

-snd is a tank. A bit difficult to learn, but it can open just about any sound file format, save in almost any format, and is a front end for an amazing amount of control through its GUI and through a programming interface. Available through FTP at: http://ccrma.stanford.edu/software/snd/. Even to run the binary though, you will at least need to install Guile 1.6, with either Fink or DarwinPorts. See the Readme.snd file about this, and let me know if you are having troubles.

-Amadeus is a good, cheap shareware editor. http://www.hairersoft.com/

-Spark is available in a free LE version. Crashes alot... I've heard others swear by it.

-Audacity can also do basic sound editing, but stores files in its own format, so you have to export audio to access the soundfiles again. http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

2) A Digital Audio Workstation

-We will be using Ardour (http://www.ardour.org). This is developed for the Linux system, but also works well in OS X. Version 0.99.2 is very stable, and binaries are avalable for download. Ardour2 is still alpha, but so far, I like it much better. As with everything alpha, SAVE OFTEN!!!!

-Digital Performer. Quite spendy. But one of the industry standards. Some lab machines have this installed.

-Audacity will also work well as a DAW, but is limited to stereo.

3) A set of DSP plugins (optional, but recommended).

LADSPA (Linux Audio) plugins are free, and quite powerful. Works well in OS X and Ardour.

Waves are also excellent, but very expensive. Once again, some lab machines have these loaded in.

Apple's AudioUnits are also available to mane audio apps, and there are a number of VST plug-ins of varying cost and quality.