several routes to take to digital heaven?

Whoa! Nice site. You're talking about starting with some pretty nice base units and some extensive mods. So moving up a couple of major price points might indeed put you in the $5-$10k range for comparisons. Thanks for pointing out the site. Good luck.

Viridian, you can rest assured I took no offense; all these sites are really just to have conversations on common subjects; I could never take offense and have used your phrase many times in other areas and smiled when I read yours. I respect your support of vinyl; I cannot get past what I consider laborious and minute preparations to play vinyl and any crackling pop and other noises drive me up the wall as much as fingernails raked across a blackboard; I mentioned Bob Stuart's interviews because his take is no different than those who stand for the proposition that vinyl is the truth and digital is the red-haired stepchild, except in reverse. By the way, I loved camp; went four years to Camp Fuller in Rhode Island, 1963-1967, which provided me with some of my fondest memories of my childhood.