I would say all 3, to be honest people rave about mastering externally, which if you want to sell your CD's is probably the way to do it.
But this is also a hobby for some of us, you have train spotters and train drivers, do you need to drive a train just to be interested?
I like playing with Izotope ozone for mastering, you get an idea of whats going on once you get used to it, and you can add a finished touch to a mix.
One thing I would suggest it getting a graphic eq (sound forge has one) pop your fav songs in it and tweak each band over the course of 30 hours or so untill you really get a good ear for whats going on.
One thing I notice with a lot of basic home mixes is that a lot of the presence (10-15k ish) is lacking, because they spending long time trying to get good bass for example.
But how much of your kick drums volume comes from 80-120hz? How can much of it come from there on tiny headphones? These sorts of questions help you to have a good ear and potentially can help with some basic home mastering.
Also a really good treated room is a must - however plenty of monitoring enviroments is the only alternative until you appreciate the problems with your room.
As for good kit, you can get nto wasting lots of money on this hobby, you cant just shove a mix through a magic piece of kit.
However you can master with cheaper alternatives and do a better job if you know what you are doing than spending 5 grand and just going mad at it
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