If I go with CQC to control my HAI & audio system (whether it's russound or nuvo), and then put a riva client on my ipad/iphone - is my experience close to what I can do with Sonos iphone client out of the box on the audio side?
While I haven't used Sonos, I 'd say that yes, your experience should be similar. JKish on CQC has created some really nice templates for music. He has added a bunch of custom macros and such that allows much better searching and viewing of such material. I'd recommend checking it out.
Obviously you would need to modify those templates to fit an iPad/iPhone size, but you can see what is possible.