Logitech Squeezebox Touch DAC: How Good?

I just replaced my Squeezebox 3 with a Touch and, although it needs break in, the increased resolution was apparent from the onset. I am using the CI Power Supply, Monarchy Combo and Berkeley DAC. The installation of the Monarchy between the Touch (and previously Squeezebox) was absolutely amazing. I HIGHLY recommend the Monarchy Combo to anyone with a Squeezebox (going into an outboard DAC which can handle the upsampled 96k signal).

I have about 300 hours on the Touch and listened last night for about 5 hours. The unit is definitely broken. It is more resolving and has better detail than the Squeezebox 3 it replaced. The biggest difference is the 3D sound hologram that it now projects. The Squeezebox 3/MonarchyCombo/Berkeley had front to back and layers of soundstage before but it was something you had to look for. The Touch throws out a beautiful, glow in the dark, soundtsage that just makes you want to listen. I was a bit skeptic about the superiority of the Touch's digital out vs the digital out on the SB3 but after experiencing both units, the Touch is notches above the SB3. (both SB and Touch w/Channel Island PS, display turned off on both).

Can either the 'Touch or SB be run as wireless clients without internet access or a wireless router?
I connect to internet with wires, but turn on my Airport in the confuser when I want to stream music to my AirPort Express......

I'm new to the Squeezebox Touch. I quite like the sound of hi-rez .flac files transported over wifi and passed by coax digital from the SBT to my Mark Levinson 30.6. But there is a lot of hashy grain in the louder sections of orchestral music.

But, for playing Apple Lossless CD rips, the SBT does NOT sound as good as my airport express driving the the same Levinson 30.6 DAC through a Toslink connection. The SBT sound stage seems vague, almost confusing compared to the APE.

Is anyone else having this problem?

Could Flac files sound better? I think I am using the SBT server application to do the decoding, but I am not certain.

Is the volume control on the Touch always kept up at 100%?

Kal