Noob Needs Help With Home Theater Setup

[The Gootz]

I'm looking at purchasing and installing a home theater system and could use some help from the experts. I've looked at both packages and piecing together the system and are open to both and possibly a combination if need be. I went to Best Buy to listen to the different brands of speakers/systems and really liked the MartinLogan brand if that helps narrow down things. Here are the details on what I'm looking at:

-$1k budget (including everything, but would like to spend less)
-7.1? - Capability to play a movie/game/tv in the main room, while playing something separately for my daughter in her room (will be installing speakers throughout the whole house and possibly a pair of outdoor speakers). Also to be able to play music in the kitchen when we're cooking, but doesn't play in any other room (forgot what this feature is called).
-30% TV, 30% games, 25% movies, 15% music
-Good, clean highs/mids and solid, deep bass - sometimes I like to really crank it up, so I want a system that can handle that without distortion
-I will be hooking this up to my 46" HDTV, PS3 and my cable feed is coming through a 1080p DVR box

I've looked at the Onkyo S6300 and aside from the running hot and no sub protection issues, it looks like a pretty solid HTIB. The only components I'd need to add to this are speakers for our master bedroom, baby's room and kitchen. Any thoughts on this system? Are there any others you'd recommend like a Denon DHT591BA or anything else?

 

[The Gootz]

I should've included the room specs. The actual room itself doubles as our dining room since it's such a wide, open space. The entertainment "room" where the system will be installed is approximately 14' deep x 16' wide. The entire room is ~ 25' wide.

Right now I have a cheap RCA 5.1 system my wife bought me a LONG time ago that is outdated and in dire need of upgrading. I know enough about what I like to know that I want a better quality system. When I was in Best Buy the audio "specialist" told me that the 7.1 will allow me to utilize 2 different channels where I can play a game in the main entertainment room and some baby music in my daughter's room, for instance. Is this correct? Or should I just get a higher quality 5.1 with a channel box to allow me to turn on/off multiple channels at once?

 

[MDS]

When I was in Best Buy the audio "specialist" told me that the 7.1 will allow me to utilize 2 different channels where I can play a game in the main entertainment room and some baby music in my daughter's room, for instance. Is this correct? Or should I just get a higher quality 5.1 with a channel box to allow me to turn on/off multiple channels at once?

Yes, most 7.1 receivers include a powered 'zone 2' capability. They use the rear surround channel amps to power a second set of speakers and allow you to have 5.1 in the main zone while simultaneously listening to 2 channel stereo (with the same or different source) in the second zone.

You'd still want that capability even if you were to use a speaker selector to choose from more than one pair of additional speakers. If you have more than one pair of speakers in 'zone 2' (say in different rooms) you'd have the same source playing on all of them but could use a speaker selector to choose which pair(s) are active.