@Formae
After a month of spending hours a day looking into this, this is what I have ended up purchasing.
Alpha Dogs
Sony MA900
E12
1/4" to 1/8" adapter
Sansa Clip+ with Rockbox
Essence STX sound card (had the sound card)
Many people on these boards will scoff at that list of equipment. However it is of my opinion that the delta between that list, and spending $4,000 more on portable and desktop upgrades yields an extremely small improvement in performance.
You have to remember most people here are hobbyists and enthusiasts. When I was a pro paintball player, I can remember spending hours talking about the quality of the aftermarket pneumatic upgrades I did. I threw away the $200, for the $400 upgrade, and went on and on about how it will help with my game. In the end I am sure it really didn't matter. I won and lost the same.
Same goes here. I am sure with either the setup I have above, or a vastly more expensive setup, the music will be equally enjoyable.
To answer your previous question about balanced:
What balanced means, is the signal is sent down two separate wires reversed. What this does without going into two much detail, is allows interference the cable comes into contact with to be canceled out (provided both wires get the same amount of interference). This is popular for headphones when you need a long run, or microphones on any run.
I really can't see any reason why you would need balanced cables, so unless you just want them, I would not worry about it.