I was going to add at the end: Do the cheapest transfer you can
and then if it doesn't sound right start to add better components.

I've only really done this a few times: once from a cassette
tape sent to me from England of a phonograph record made in
the 70's. I transferred the content through a boom box to the
jacks in a small Nakamichi receiver (mini desktop) and then to
the sound card. This still worked pretty good-- as good as could
be expected for a second or third generation source.

The quality of reproduction will never be the same as the
original and so these digitizing from alternate source
routines should only be attempted for content not retrievable
some other way.

My sound wave editing program of choice in Windows is Goldwave 5.
It's shareware available free on trial. I wound up paying Chris
for a registered user version.