The final white version of the BS9000 will be an absolute classic.  It would be nice to own one.

I am beginning to think that CDs are the new vinyl especially with the various methods of downloading music.  However I don't think all the bits are there to stop buying and playings CDs.  

I agree that lossless music files sound just like a CD but for the time being, one must rip a CD to get a lossless file.  There are some download services that have FLAC and lossless downloads available.  As a lover of classical music, my choices are mostly limited to continuing to purchase and rip CDs  Deutsche Grammophon does sell 312kb MP3 download that are quite good.

I too hope Beosound 5 is wonderful but my experience as an owner of Beomedia 1 leads me to believe I should wait for the MKII version of Beosound 5.

What I will be looking for in the Beosound 5 is a digital output connector, ability to play large lossless files from multiple discs in the same album, and of course Apple lossless capabilities. 

1 leads me to believe I should wait for the MKII version of Beosound 5.

Why?

I have had my Beomedia 1 for about 3 years.  During that time, the software was upgraded once.  Can you imagine a Windows based machine with only 1 software update in 3 years.

The menus are difficult to follow and the documentation is not really very good.  I must admit that in my case, I had to install the machine myself because the dealer had nobody able to do it.  

The real problem is the organization of music.  If you have an album with multiple disc files, it does not sort by disk number.  This is also true of downloadeded music from Amazon and others.  If you are loading a single disk album, there is no problem.

The internet radio function is what I use most of the time.  Luckily the stations I like are in the B&O database.  If you want to listen to a station not in the database, it cannot be loaded manually.  However you can request B&O add a station to the database.

The system cannot play large Microsoft lossless files.