If you are not interested in doing any of this wirelessly, it is really pretty easy. You may want an external hard drive. 500 GB = $120 with firewire/USB/Esota connection options. 1 Terabyte $225, same as above. Go to Best Buy or Circuit City or anynumber of on-line computer places for the external hard drive.
My recommendation is a Slim Devices Duet, which can be done either wirelessly or wired from your computer. It includes a remote control that has an interface similar to an iPod, so you can see album art.
Short of this, all you need is a digital output on your computer to take to a DAC. Your computer may already have a digital output, or you can upgrade the audio card, cheap and easy. You would then control the music from your computer, wired to the DAC (or you could even bypass the DAC if you get a good audio card with analog outputs if you can find one with acceptable quality). You would then play and control your music from your computer, from any number of available programs, but even from Windows Media Player.
As for the file formats - I would suggest going to the Slim Devices (made by logitec) and get onto their forums (you will need to register). These forums are addressed specifically at what you are discussing - but also covers their products. Their forums are pretty easy to work and search within. I use WAV files, but others prefer FLAC which is a lossless format and is easier to work with for tagging your music. This will all be explained in the forums by people with more knowledge than I.
FYI: Slim Devices Forums: http://forums.slimdevices.com/
Hope this helps. For $500 you can have a Duet and a 500 GB hard drive up and running. Also, the external hard drives are nice to have. You can get a group of friends together and use a traveling hard drive to exchange and share large quantities of music! Short of burning in all of your CDs, you could be up and running in about 2 hours with limited computer expertise (like me).
My recommendation is a Slim Devices Duet, which can be done either wirelessly or wired from your computer. It includes a remote control that has an interface similar to an iPod, so you can see album art.
Short of this, all you need is a digital output on your computer to take to a DAC. Your computer may already have a digital output, or you can upgrade the audio card, cheap and easy. You would then control the music from your computer, wired to the DAC (or you could even bypass the DAC if you get a good audio card with analog outputs if you can find one with acceptable quality). You would then play and control your music from your computer, from any number of available programs, but even from Windows Media Player.
As for the file formats - I would suggest going to the Slim Devices (made by logitec) and get onto their forums (you will need to register). These forums are addressed specifically at what you are discussing - but also covers their products. Their forums are pretty easy to work and search within. I use WAV files, but others prefer FLAC which is a lossless format and is easier to work with for tagging your music. This will all be explained in the forums by people with more knowledge than I.
FYI: Slim Devices Forums: http://forums.slimdevices.com/
Hope this helps. For $500 you can have a Duet and a 500 GB hard drive up and running. Also, the external hard drives are nice to have. You can get a group of friends together and use a traveling hard drive to exchange and share large quantities of music! Short of burning in all of your CDs, you could be up and running in about 2 hours with limited computer expertise (like me).