I've been getting lots of good feedback on the use of FLAC, so if that cuts storage space in half, with no penalty, that can't be a bad thing. I'm still trying to figure out about the other 3 questions. But if I want to make a CD-R or a DVD-R from stored FLAC files, then I'd need to convert them to .WAV first, then burn them? Maybe I'll just leave them all in .WAV as I have 120 Gig storage, and can always buy more storage...

Still not sure which M-Audio sound card product to get, which ripping software to use... Does Roxio support FLAC? How does Roxio differ from Winamp or foobar 2000? I have no experience other than making CD-R's from the bundled Roxio software that comes with Plextor drives, so I need big time guidance in this area...

7.1 System