Surely if I ask enough newbie question, I will run out at some point. Anyway, right now I run my mics into a SP battery box with bass roll-off and a 9V battery. This is my pre-amp right? So when I get my UA-5 will I still need to run through this? I know it has phantom power but its 48v right?
Keep asking, that's how people learn, and it's one of the primary reasons this forum exists.
Without knowing specifically which battery box and mics you have, I believe the answer is: your SP battery box provides 9v of phantom power to your mics but is not a preamp (and obviously not an ADC).
The UA5 provides 48v phantom power
and a preamp
and an ADC. I believe you will
fry your SP mics if you feed them 48v of phantom power from the UA5.
FWIW, between your mics and your digital storage medium, you need three things:
[1] power for the mics
[2] gain
[3] analog to digital conversion
Your SP battery box is providing [1]. Other standalone phantom power devices fulfilling this function include: Denecke PS-2, AKG B18, Stewart BPS-1. But these all provide 48v phantom power instead of 9v like your SP box.
Typically, [1] and [2] are packaged together in outboard preamps: Lunatec V2, Sonosax SX-M2, Sound Devices MP2, etc.
Sometimes, [2] and [3] are packaged together: Denecke AD-20.
And sometimes, [1], [2], and [3] are packaged together: Lunatec V3, Apogee Minime, Apogee AD1K, Edirol UA5.