If I had money to burn, the main video monitor would be a 72-inch screen with a 3-beam front projection unit (& I might include one of those 50-inch plasma screens as well), the electronics would be Krell, and the speakers would be Martin-Logan electrostatics - and there would be several of those Sony DVD changers.

Both systems would have digital satellite receivers.

There are certainly other very good brand/model choices, however, any of these would be consistently good regardless of model changes.

~ GaySatyr

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My point is that I'd want the largest screen possible for the money and 16:9 screens are just not cost-effective thus far.

As for the cost of my high-end, low-ball system, one of the beauties of home theater is that you can start with a little and add more later. Buy high quality where it counts so you don't waste money later trading. Start with just the television. Then add outboard AV in the form of a tuner-preamp or receiver with the left & right front channel speakers, leaving rear & center channel speakers and the subwoofer for later. If you go for the tuner-preamp, buy a smaller power amp now and switch it for use with the rear channels later, buying a more powerful unit for the front channel speakers. Or buy a stereo-only digital AV receiver with outputs for additional channels of amplification to be used later. The front channel speakers can become the rear channel speakers later. You get the idea.

I just don't see scrimping on quality for quantity or volume. When you buy products at the quality level of Adcom (and its peers) or NHT, you don't need to scrap what you have when you modify and expand your system later.

~ GaySatyr

Edited by - GaySatyr on 3/11/2003 3:30:07 AM

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As far as the electronics are concerned, you don't have to go high end. Home electronics are like PC's. Features that were only available in last years top of the line models are now available in this years entire line.

The one thing that I wouldn't skimp on are the speakers. Speakers don't work like electronics. Features don't really "trickle down". But I think that even with speakers, GaySaytr's recommendation to build the system piece by piece. However, when doing this, make sure that you choose a brand and stick with it. You don't want right & left speakers from manufacturer "A", a center channel speaker from manufacturer "B" and surround speakers from "C". The only exception to this rule is probably the sub-woofer (but in my case even my sub-woofer matches the rest of the speakers (M&K).

As well as hometheaterforum, check out the AV Science Forum.

As far as my ultimate setup, I would have a Runco projector with a 100" screen, M&K Professional speakers and probably ada or Adcom audio electronics. I agree with GaySaytr's DVD player recommendations and there would definitely be a DirecTV HD receiver (possibly a Dish receiver too for Discovery HD). If I was doing it today, there would be an OTA antenna on the roof for network feeds. However, Cablevision added HD earlier this month on Long Island, so I might consider waiting for them to get clearance for local HD network feeds (which they don't yet have)

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With all the money I have spent over the years, my friend with the Kenwood THX receiver and Toshiba 4:3 big-screen, old Toshiba DVD player, and high-end but not audiophile quality speaker set, has a comparable system to my own at thousands less.

Consider going to Best Buy/Circuit City/whatever electronics store, etc. and using their zero percent financing for a year, that way you are not paying all the cash up front and the extra you'll spend at the store will be covered partially by interest saved and by the fact that you can easily return defective product.

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