Music from hard drive better than CD?

Dylans4bass, thanks for the info. I dug through the Apple website and found confirmation about the conversion to Apple Lossless with Airport Express. It was buried midway within a 31 page tech document. What confuses me is where the conversion actually takes place. Is it in the computer running iTunes/AirTunes or is it in the Airport Express. I would assume it's in the computer, but when I run the Activity Monitor I do not see any additional CPU or disk activity when playing music through Airport Express vs. the internal computer speaker.

BTW, what does your webname signify?

Fom the Tact hackers group:

--- In TacTHackers@yahoogroups.com, "kana4813" wrote:

Not cheap, but for those who don't want to use their PC, here's another approach:
http://www.qsonix.com/Public/Default.aspx

I realize that the topic is pointing towards a Single PC serving to a Single Dac on a Main System...
But Can a Single PC Serve Music over a Network, to Other DACs and Amplifiers, Simultaneously to Create Multi-Room listening...
Or to state it differently... The Same Music is being Played on Different Systems Throughout the House, over the Network, Being Sourced from a Single PC/Harddrive.

Also Does Anyone Have any OtherLinks to CHAT on this subject trough Audio Asylum or ???

Jmesarch-

You may want to look at the Roku Soundbridge products, the Slimp3, and the CD30. They are network audio devices, and I think they are all "server-push" so they will allow you to run multiple remotes off a single computer. Don't know whether they will permit multiple remotes to play the same exact music, however, since the network is running a point-to-point protocol. You might look into using the computer to create a stream like the netradio stations and using the remotes to access that if playing the same thing from multiple places is important. I think most of these things have digital outputs as well as analog. I suspect the analog outs are pretty suspect for audiophiles, but if you are just looking for ambient background music, probably works...

Dig around in the digital forums here. There is a bunch of info on folk's server based systems.

Dazzdax - a properly configured computer makes an excellent transport. But I would always use an external DAC. There is just no way to properly shield/isolate/power condition the DAC on a PC soundcard.