trEs2b,
Welcome to the forum.
With that healthy of a speaker budget you have lots of options.
- Plan to spend a healthy portion of your speaker budget on between one to four subwoofers (depending on your answer to question #1 below).
- You may want to consider planning to spenda couple $K less on speakers/subs and use the extra funds on acoustic room treatments.
- BB even with Magnolia has a very limited slice of the available options; and in general, I would not trust the advice of their sales force without independent verification through your own research and/or checking this or other audio forums. I am not saying they are dishonest, I am saying in most cases they are not very well trained/educated about quality audio.
Answering the following questions should help narrow the field of choices.
1) What is the size of the room and how many/where are the seats are you trying to provide a HT experience?
2) What are the room's features (windows, openings/doors, flooring type, cathederal ceiling, etc)
3) Do you/your wife have a preference for bookshelf speakers on stands or tower speakers?
4) Are you comfortable with internet direct (ID) purchases?
- If so, there are many good options in this realm (to name a few in alphabetical order: Ascend Acoustics, HSU, Philharmonic Audio, Salk, SVS, etc.) most with try-at-home return policies that can make auditioning the equipment very affordable.
5) Looks are very subjective, do you mean speakers with high quality wood surfaces or avant garde/modern/European designs, etc?
More to follow later,
XEagleDriver