Timing in After Effects

Whats the best way to go about timing your graphics to an audio script. Right now im listening to the audio on windows media player, trying to guess the time, and making it happen in after effects. But the guess and check crap is pissing me off and i hate rendering over and over to check. Is there a better way to go about this?

also, is there a place i can set the render setting to what i want to i dont have to set them every stinking time?