does it get any more simple than this?

[turbo16v]

http://www.techradar.com/reviews/audio-visual/av-accessories/pure-digital-i-20-921473/review

Seems like good and cheap way to listen to lossless files (wired)
Price wise if you had to buy an ipod say the classic 160 plus the pure you would be at 350.00. What other options would work for a non streaming music server in that price range?

 

[bikemig]

This looks great, especially for the price ($100). HRT makes an istreamer but it runs around $200, http://www.highresolutiontechnologies.com/istreamer/. Personally I prefer a wireless set-up as I like being able to sync the music around the house but for a $100 I might just try out the i-20 ipod dock.

 

[jinjuku]

I know that HRT has a good reputation. I am looking that them and Musiland Monitor 02 for my 2.0 DAC.

For $100 I would tell you to go for it.

 

[bikemig]

I know that that istreamer takes a pure digital stream from the ipod and then uses a dac to convert it to analog. This is a pretty complete review: http://www.avguide.com/review/high-resolution-technologies-istreamer-dac-playback-40. I think that the technology behind this is not straightforward and that not too many devices are capable of doing this (peachtree makes a few devices that do this, cypherlabs makes a portable device). I have not heard of the pure i 20 and if it does this for a $100, it would be a world beater. I'd like to read more about it before buying one since my understanding is that it is no mean feat to extract a pure digital signal from an ipod. In any case, I use an HRT musicstreamer ii in my office set-up and it clearly improved the SQ of my computer based music system. I have not heard the Musiland monitor but I know that Pacific Valve makes good products; it does take a proprietary driver, though, and I'd rather not be dependent on a third party to update the driver when needed. The HRT musicstreamers do not need a special driver.