Almost all of my voice acting experience comes from playing Dungeons & Dragons. It may sound odd, but it is really fantastic for coming up with voices. Each character we would play with would need a new personality, and for me, that meant a voice as well. Rough Scottish sounding Dwarves and effeminate almost British sounding Elves. A fun past-time of mine has been to mimic voices I hear in shows or on the radio.
I am currently a college student. I have little in the way of professional training for voice acting. I took some theater classes and an AV class in high school. And I currently play an online role playing game where I speak with other players, often times, in character. Which gives me plenty of practice on a regular basis.
I do have some sound equipment. Microphone, and speakers. My computer does have CoolEdit Pro, Magix, and FruityLoops. With those three programs I can sample my voice or other sounds, create an atmosphere or environment for them, even a soundtrack. It may not be much in the way of hardware, but the software I have is pretty darn good.
I have done a lot of costumer service face-to-face and over-the-phone. I have mastered soft, low speech that can calm the listener. From the same work, I have found that the same type of speech does not work with all people. Depending on Age, Sex, Nationality, and other factors, I change the way I sound to almost every person I speak with. This is a trait I would think would come in very handy for a person in the voice acting field.