[Darryl Ramm]

You mention

One at a time...

Drum machine (or vi?)
Bass
Guitar
...

So on the interface: Do you have nice guitar amps and cabs and mics for them today? And a setup where you can record them today? If not (or if it’s not great) you are very likely better off starting with an Eleven Rack because it is pretty darn good amp sim, gives you basic effects and a good beginner interface as well (has one “average” preamp/mic input). Absolutely fine to get started with overall and a super fun box for any guitar or bass player. And it’s a frogging bargain at a few hundred dollars. And you will get good help from other users here. If you want to spend much more there are fancier options, but nothing touches it at those prices.

You may also get better general advice if you list the other equipment you are working with. Again don’t over fixate on one component like wanting a “quality” interface at the expense of monitors or mics. What interface are you using now?

I would very likely started with the Eleven Rack and then add a higher end interface later if needed and hand the Eleven Rack off that via S/PDIF.

You really need to pay attention to the whole signal chain. Do you have good monitors and headphones (for tracking vocals etc), is the room treated? Do you have some decent starter microphones —for the type of work you are doing. Etc. All that stuff can cost much more than a laptop and interface.

Windows laptops are a sad crapshoot with Pro Tools. I would not bother, I just use a MacBook Pro. Hopefully somebody can give you specific recommendations—like exact model/co fig they are using. Talking about brands does not really help you know it will run well. I would look for something with fast internal PCIe/NVMe SSD (and run sessions on the internal drive), 32 GB of DRAM (esp. if it is not upgradeable) and at least 4 cores... can you get away with less, sure. But nobody can guess what your sessions actually look like.