This is a fine way to go.
Ther Mini is very quiet. Not familiar with it but I am sure that the hard drive you chose is fine - size is certainly right, will hold a couple of thousand CDs. Firewire is fine, USB2 will also work and there are more choices available.
There are a number of hard drives designed to match the Mini form factor you might want to check out if you haven't purchased yet. Makes a nice tidy installation
BTW - You will need two drives - one for back-up. That one need not live in the same room - in fact part of the idea of back-up is to physically separate the two. It's not just about hardware failure, it's also about environmental threats.
The biggest single thing you can do to ensure quality is to make sure you rip all your music in iTunes lossless with error correction on.
USB DAC is definitely the way to go for what you want to accomplish. The PS unit looks like a nice piece but is expensive and doesn't seem to have much buzz.
Lots of choices out there. One recent hot one that is a few hundred less is the Paradisea from Taiwan - google for the review. The Benchmark Media Systems DAC 1 has been the hot ticket at the same price point as the PS Audio unit. The other long time favorite at this price point is the Apogee Mini-DAC which came out of the recording studio side of things and has been on the market for several years. You might also be able to find a used Wavelength Brick at the pricepoint which is a very fine unit with a tube buffer.
Two schools of thought on oversampling, many of us don't like it... Fun to play with as long as you can turn it off. Personally it would not be a must have.
Look to NewEgg,Frys or Dell for the monitor and think about how you want to mount it. Samsung makes fine stuff that looks very clean. Wait till after New Years and you should save a few bux.
Finally (and forgive me if this is obvious) if the Mini is going to be your ripping station, you need to make sure that the Mini is on the Internet. Couple of reasons: first that's how it populates the database with all the information about the CD - something you don't want to do by hand. Second, Internet radio might suit you. Also the easiest way to handle software upgrades, sample downloads, look for album cover art etc
Once you get set up, you might want to try some isolation under the Mini/drive stack - Herbies tender feet or Vibrapods would be a low end way to go or try whatever you have lying around to see if it makes a difference. Also use at least as good a pair of ICs from the DAC to your pre as you use on your other sources - makes a big difference.
If you want to drill into any specific aspect of this, there are huge amounts of info here and on the Audio Asylum Digital PC Audio Forum
Ther Mini is very quiet. Not familiar with it but I am sure that the hard drive you chose is fine - size is certainly right, will hold a couple of thousand CDs. Firewire is fine, USB2 will also work and there are more choices available.
There are a number of hard drives designed to match the Mini form factor you might want to check out if you haven't purchased yet. Makes a nice tidy installation
BTW - You will need two drives - one for back-up. That one need not live in the same room - in fact part of the idea of back-up is to physically separate the two. It's not just about hardware failure, it's also about environmental threats.
The biggest single thing you can do to ensure quality is to make sure you rip all your music in iTunes lossless with error correction on.
USB DAC is definitely the way to go for what you want to accomplish. The PS unit looks like a nice piece but is expensive and doesn't seem to have much buzz.
Lots of choices out there. One recent hot one that is a few hundred less is the Paradisea from Taiwan - google for the review. The Benchmark Media Systems DAC 1 has been the hot ticket at the same price point as the PS Audio unit. The other long time favorite at this price point is the Apogee Mini-DAC which came out of the recording studio side of things and has been on the market for several years. You might also be able to find a used Wavelength Brick at the pricepoint which is a very fine unit with a tube buffer.
Two schools of thought on oversampling, many of us don't like it... Fun to play with as long as you can turn it off. Personally it would not be a must have.
Look to NewEgg,Frys or Dell for the monitor and think about how you want to mount it. Samsung makes fine stuff that looks very clean. Wait till after New Years and you should save a few bux.
Finally (and forgive me if this is obvious) if the Mini is going to be your ripping station, you need to make sure that the Mini is on the Internet. Couple of reasons: first that's how it populates the database with all the information about the CD - something you don't want to do by hand. Second, Internet radio might suit you. Also the easiest way to handle software upgrades, sample downloads, look for album cover art etc
Once you get set up, you might want to try some isolation under the Mini/drive stack - Herbies tender feet or Vibrapods would be a low end way to go or try whatever you have lying around to see if it makes a difference. Also use at least as good a pair of ICs from the DAC to your pre as you use on your other sources - makes a big difference.
If you want to drill into any specific aspect of this, there are huge amounts of info here and on the Audio Asylum Digital PC Audio Forum