In terms of storing your music collection have you seen the Vortexbox Appliance? There a few to choose from and they seem to offer a pretty good solution. Decent storage and a well thought out software as well as auto-ripping to FLAC. I'm sure you could get a better rip for FLACs with optimising settings etc but for computerphobes like me a system like this is very appealing. You can even use their software free so can build you own if you're either handy with electronics or even just turn an old computer into one.
http://www.vortexbox.co.uk/VortexBox...78_706542.aspx
Another little tip is if you haven't already is to disable the volume on the Touch and set it to 100%, not just turned up, there is actually a setting to disable the control. It really cleared things up for me.