Is this the END of DAYS for the high end CD player

One giant benefit that Jim Smith didn't mention was the access to radio stations from around the world. If you love CD's and never rip a CD to a hard drive, think of a computer like a tuner that can dial into literally thousands of radio stations: every college station, every public radio station, jazz stations from Paris, Madrid, Rio, San Fransisco, and on and on.

Regarding buying CD's: Sorry to hear about those having a hard time buying CD's but the thrift stores in my town are chock full of used discs. There is also a constant stream of people on Craigslist selling their collections as they rip them to their computer. This may be the benefit of living in a college town.

Good luck, Bill. As with everything else in audio, it may take some finessing to get the sound you like, but I think once you do, you'll love the instant access to all of your (digital) music.

If you are going with a Mac Mini, you'll find information all over the web on how to best configure it for use as a music server.

Post a thread and let us know how it goes.

Along with the theme of this thread, I think the way music gets distributed will dramatically change. I think it'll be downloaded from the artists site directly eventually. I say this because a lot of them currently have their concerts available for download on their sites. They're generally available in mp3 and FLAC. They also have album artwork and CD labels. For an example, check out Live Metallica dot com. Pearl Jam one ups it by adding the option of having a CD created for you. Last I looked, Phish has their concerts available in high-res. Prices are z bit absurd though. The others I've seen are around $10 for mp3 and $12 for FLAC.

I think it's a matter of time until they ask themselves why can't they do that with studio recordings too. I'd love high-res downloads direct from the artist. So long as I have a way of making a hard copy backup though.

I have looked around quite a bit here and on the web (particularly on "Computer Audiophile" for a good succinct article explaining how to get the highest fidelity out of a computer-based system. Can anyone who has already implemented one and/or done the research direct me to a good article that breaks it down? Or can people describe what solutions they have come up with that works? It seems to me that burning your CDs onto a hard drive or music server in AIFF is the way to go (but why is that better than WAV, or is it?) The hard drive then feeds a computer (usually an Apple product) that then feeds a DAC which in turn feeds the preamp. Are so-called music servers better than your basic hard drive and, if so, why? What is the ideal solution for commanding the system (as in, pick out and tell it what song to play next)? Is there any loss of fidelity with the wireless systems, like, say, the Modwright Transporter? And, if you had a Mac Mini, is there any loss of fidelity for it to read off the hard drive wirelessly or is it better to have a direct connection?