Basic Recording Help

Alright guys so lately I was toying around with the idea of watching my drums in wavelength form. To analyze my playing and to fine tune my timing.

My main concern, initially, is whether or not every drum/cymbal will need to be mic'd up or if there is an alternative..I am not looking for CD quality demo's just a simple setup to port it all into a DAW on my computer.

Furthermore, I guess depending on the mic requirements I am curious to see what I can by with in terms of an inexpensive interface between my computer and drums. Should I be looking for a soundcard or a USB mixer?

Thanks for any Input

I have never known anyone that was this concerned with analyzing their timing in this way.

The optimum would be to track everything separately so that you could see how each track lined up.
That is not cheap!
A Firewire mixer and multitrack software will be needed.

Practicing with a click at different speeds is the best way to develop timing.
Minor timing mistakes are routinely fixed in the studio during mix.

That's an interesting approach. Is there something wrong with hearing what you're doing? I would think playing a metronome through a small amp and putting up a mic to a cassette recorder to record both you and the metronome would be alot easier.

You can also use a usb mic.
Simply open GarageBand and play to a click while you listen to your playing through
noise reduction headphones along with the click that GarageBand creates.

I just bought a TC Electronic Impact Twin sound interface. What it does is pretty amazing for the price, and I think they have a cheaper one with less tracks.
I'm not after pro studio quality at the moment, so I'm using two cheap PZM mics, and I'll buy a cheap bass drum mic tomorrow, because I need more bottom. I do have a small mixing board, but you wouldn't need one if you'd use only two mics.
I just tested the set-up last Friday, and recorded myself playing along a drumless Tower of Power track, using Garage Band, and I think the results are pretty good so far. With some fine tuning I can probably make it sound much better. Let me know if you wanna hear what I did in just a few minutes.
I intend to use this set-up to demo my playing, and also to record my students so they can go home with their tracks.
One of the most interesting things about this interface is that it has a reverb on the headphone monitor. So I can monitor myself with a pleasing sound, but the drums are recorded without any effect. Then I can add any amount of reverb at the mix.

Cheers
Alain