Audiophile computer audio is just in its infancy, if you ask me. There is not a lot of common knowledge yet. A couple places for you to start learning are:
http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=59
http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue22/nugent.htm
First link is to a head-fi (headphone) forum dedicated to computer-sourced audio. Second link explains why computer audio sounds better than from a CD (if done properly).
There are several questions to figure out for computer based audio:
1. What quality will you encode (rip) with, and what format?
2. Is your stereo system further than a cable's distance from your computer.
3. How nice do you want the sound (i.e. how much do you want to spend).
I have my own personal biases. I would go with a lossless compression for sure, if you're going to take the time to do it, do it right once. If you have a Mac, rip with iTunes' Apple Lossless compression, and check the box for error correction, to make sure you get perfect reads from your CD's.
Squeezebox is a great solution if you need to connect wirelessly. Personally, I am going to buy a usb source (sold from either www.redwineaudio.com or www.empiricalaudio.com - there aren't many commercial products offered yet, it's mostly the modifiers building these right now). I will then feed that source through a DAC. Because a usb source can use a good clock and run from battery power (in the case of the ones I linked to), it can provide a really nice stream of audio. Basically, my understanding is you can spend $1000 (usb source and dac, say), and get something that will best a multi-thousand dollar CD player. Nice.
Of course, if you don't need super-high end, your solution can be as simple as adding a nice sound card with a good analog or digital out (if you don't mind noise added from the computer). I have heard Macs audio outputs are pretty good. My big advice would be make sure you do the data part right (encoding your CD's). You can always upgrade your gear, but I'm almost finished encoding my 500 CD collection, and believe me, I don't want to go back and do it again.
http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=59
http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue22/nugent.htm
First link is to a head-fi (headphone) forum dedicated to computer-sourced audio. Second link explains why computer audio sounds better than from a CD (if done properly).
There are several questions to figure out for computer based audio:
1. What quality will you encode (rip) with, and what format?
2. Is your stereo system further than a cable's distance from your computer.
3. How nice do you want the sound (i.e. how much do you want to spend).
I have my own personal biases. I would go with a lossless compression for sure, if you're going to take the time to do it, do it right once. If you have a Mac, rip with iTunes' Apple Lossless compression, and check the box for error correction, to make sure you get perfect reads from your CD's.
Squeezebox is a great solution if you need to connect wirelessly. Personally, I am going to buy a usb source (sold from either www.redwineaudio.com or www.empiricalaudio.com - there aren't many commercial products offered yet, it's mostly the modifiers building these right now). I will then feed that source through a DAC. Because a usb source can use a good clock and run from battery power (in the case of the ones I linked to), it can provide a really nice stream of audio. Basically, my understanding is you can spend $1000 (usb source and dac, say), and get something that will best a multi-thousand dollar CD player. Nice.
Of course, if you don't need super-high end, your solution can be as simple as adding a nice sound card with a good analog or digital out (if you don't mind noise added from the computer). I have heard Macs audio outputs are pretty good. My big advice would be make sure you do the data part right (encoding your CD's). You can always upgrade your gear, but I'm almost finished encoding my 500 CD collection, and believe me, I don't want to go back and do it again.