I use Sound Studio quite a bit, as well as Reaper. SS has a lot of limitations, but that keeps it simple, uncluttered, fast and inexpensive. Let me see if I can answer the questions.
First, I don't try to make one long file act like a CD, with track/song markers. I don't do torrents or the like, maybe this is common. My feeling is that the songs will be separate files, one for each song/track, which SS excels at.
Note that with SS, you can make all the changes to the file you want, but to save them you have to either "save" (and overwrite the previous version) or "Save As" which rewrites this modified version and keeps the original file unchanged.
You have to get used to SS's operation quirks. I also customize my upper center toolbar, to just the functions I use all of the time - fade in, fade out, Duration, and sample rate. SS used to have an item in the Audio Menu to show/select bit depth, but they got rid of it (I complained, but you can see that went nowhere). AFAIK, the only way to see the bit depth now of the current file is to try "Save As" and see what pops up, then cancel. The author told me 24 to 16 bit uses TPDF dither of some sort, no choices.
SS DOES have sample rate conversion, it's in the AUDIO menu. It's fast and simple. However, the tests at
http://src.infinitewave.ca/ seem to indicate the quality of the SRC is so so. You may have to test and see if it meets your quality level. Personally, I use Reaper for SRC, since I paid for it and it tests well.
I use the Normalize function in the Filter menu, which lets you set how many dB below zero you want it to normalize to, and peak/RMS and analyzing tracks separately or all together for processing. All of the Apple AU (Audio Units) plug-ins are also available for effects like peak limiting, but not in real-time. If normalizing doesn't make the material as loud as you want, say, due to some loud clapping net to your mics, then I'll try some AU peak limiting.
The markers are basic, they really just put a... marker, at the time spot, which you can move around and give a text label, and SS makes a nice marker list on the side. You can jump to any marker by clicking on it in the list. However, the markers don't seem to translate perfectly to other apps, I'm guessing there really isn't a standard. Markers in SS show up in Reaper, for example, but don't have the text. I don't know if these markers have some sort of selection capability in other apps/players.
My strategy is to place markers on the whole file where I want the songs/tracks to separate, then use the SS "Split by Markers" function in the Edit menu. SS will take the file and resave every marker into a separate file with a filename of the marker text label preceded by the sequence number. You need to be careful about having every marker in the right place, because it's a dumb process, and I try to do this into a new folder just for these "splits." You can also do the bit depth change during this splt by marker, but not the SRC. I try to place markers at zero crossings, but do it manually by zooming way in and test listening. My understanding is that if you are doing markers for a real CD, that the CD data frames require such divisions be at certain spots or they won't fall exactly where you tried to place them. For this, SS has a special magnification setting of 588. I think you are supposed to place CD markers using this magnification, and it will translate to the final CD. I've done all sorts of placements and have never heard a problem, but I just might be lucky or choose good spots anyway.
SS has had some glitches through its history, and definitely has many shortcomings. You can't pencil draw a waveform correction. No serious way to do complicated edits other than copy/paste. It opens polywavs like from a MixPre, but it's not clear what is playing back through the computer's 2 channels. I don't see any practical way to mix and edit multitracks, so I also need Reaper. Vertical zoom can only be done on the left side, but at least you can zoom way in vertically.
However, it works for me for this kind of simple prep work.