I set up the inputs and outputs for the m-audio audiophile usb so that I can play the cd player into the computer and play off the computer into the audiophile usb. It sounds a lot better than the audiogy 2 zs platinum in both directions, but lacks the ability that enables me to hear the audio in 2 rooms. If I play the CD player into the audiophile, I can hear it in both rooms but the computer input has a second or two of latency so it is awkward. The audiophile takes over as the only soundcard during playing so it can only output to the stereo where it is hooked up for output. Playing from the computer through the audigy allows me to hear it out of the computer speakers and the stereo simultaneously, albeit it at lesser quality. This problem will hopefully be solved with the squeezebox.
The audigy is connected to the acurus actIII via a 15' audioquest digital coax since I ran of of inputs on the Meridian 518. The audiophile is connected via a 15' run of USB cable, with a powered USB hub in the middle. The Cd player is connected to the Audiophile USB with a 1m audioquest digital coax.
Still nothing beats the pure CD system: Meridian 500 -> Meridian 518 -> MSB DAC -> McCormack TLC-1 -> DNA-125.
I've ripped nearly all my CDs with EAC as FLAC. Set up Gentoo on a fileshare server box and use 3 IDE disks (200Gb, 250Gb, 120Gb) for media via Samba. It takes about 15 minutes per CD to get a perfect copy using EAC but it helps doing 3 at a time (2 drives + laptop) and it's taken a few weeks to get them all. EAC really runs better/faster with more RAM, nearly twice as fast running a single instance on my laptop with 1.5Gb RAM vs 2 instances with 1Gb RAM on my desktop, even though my desktop is faster (2.8 Ghz P4 vs 2.0Ghz P4Mobile). Almost 4500 songs from about 400 CDs and it is so nice having them all available at the touch of a button. This does not include the ~300 complete live shows in shorten format already saved. I'm playing using Foobar which is an awesome program and plan to get the squeezebox to play through the MSB DAC.
Got a Marantz 7500 for the 'rents home theater for $800 which is $200 off list, next thing is speakers which will probably end up being paradigms to match the in-walls.