Receiver/In wall speakers/Plasma chioces

[beefyk]

I am putting a system together for my Great Room: 15' wide, 16' deep, 11' flat ceilings, carpeted, budget of $1500 for speakers, sub and receiver. It opens to the eating area so there is no back wall. I need a nice sounding system with in walls and in ceilings for surround. I would like to have a 50" or so plasma or LCD. I like the Panasonic TH-50PX60U or TH-50PHD9UK. Any suggestions on others in the $1500 price range. I would like to hang the TV on the wall to save room. I want in walls/ceilings to save room, for asthetics, and because I don't want to see my daughter pull a speaker down on herself. I will be using the system for TV/Movies 60% of the time, listining to music 30% and playing XBOX 10%. The XBOX 360 will be used for playing DVDs and CDs and will be connected to the receiver via a Monster Cable component cable. I will use HDMI from the cable box to the receiver and from the receiver to the TV.
I work at a place that sells A/V components. My price on some of the receivers they sell:
Denon AVR 1707 $320, AVR 2307 $570
Onkyo TX SR505 $260, SR 575 $340, SR 605 $405
Harman Kardon AVR 247 $390, AVR 347 $600
Sony STR-DG910 $380
Yamaha RX-V661BL $360, V861BL $640
I want 7.1 in case I upgrade from 5.1 someday. I also need HDMI and XM radio compatiblity.
For speakers, one of the installers at my work suggested Niles HDLCR ($165 ea) for the front 3 speakers and 6CMHDFX ($195 pair) for the surround in the ceiling with a Klipsch RW-12d ($440) for the sub. I asked about Klipsch for the in walls and he said unless I went with the KL-7800-THX ($475 ea) I wouldn't have a matching center channel. I don't know why I couldn't use three R5800-s ($165 ea) for the fronts and two R5800-c ($165 ea) for the surrounds? My work also carries JBL, Infinity, and few other brands. I have seen others suggest Paradigm for in walls so I listened to what I was told were the bookshelf eqivelent of the PV 160's today. They were less than impressive. The salesman told me that was the best I could afford in that brand with my budget. I see Polk sells enclosures for their in walls. Would something like that help other in wall speakers? Any opinons on my situation would be appreciated. I know in walls/ceilings won't make for the ideal HT, but I'd really like to keep the room looking clean. Maybe in couple of years I can finish the basement and do something better down there. Thanks.

 

[Seth=L]

You could do the Klipsch R5800 stuff, there shouldn't be any problem.

I do think you could get a much better sub for your money. There are very nice offerings from Velodyne, SVS, HSU, and many others that would be better than the Klipsch sub.

For the receiver I would probably go for the Onkyo TX-SR605, it is the only receiver listed that has HDMI 1.3 and the all the lossless format decoding on-board.(Dolby Digital Plus, TrueHD, and DTS-HD master audio.

As far as the TVs go, pick the one with the picture you like the most, and they same can be said for your speakers.

 

[smurphy522]

Hi there Beefyk,
I would go with either the Yamaha, H/K or Onkyo $400 offerings. While the Onkyo has more in the video end (1.3a and lossless HD audio processing) I think the H/K and even the Yamaha sound overall better. Now also keep in mind I see that you want to do an HDMI cable to the TV from the receiver. None of the receivers will take a 1080i component signal and output it to HDMI in 1080i. The H/K 247 will output HDMI @ 720p in the case of analog inputs like: component, s-video and composite. This is due to the SCALER's capability being that of 720p output. To keep the component signal 1080i (if really required, this really depends on TV resolution, the Panasonics in question would be fine with the 720p and it would be deinterlaced through a good scaler too) you would need to run a component cable to the TV also.

Basically if you have a 1080i or p source and direct it through the receiver to the TV it should be all HDMI. If it is a 720p signal (matter not digital or analog) the receivers will pass it through the scaler and output it via HDMI in 720p.

Keep in mind too that there is very little discernable difference between 1080i and 720p.

This was copied from Cnets "review" of the Onkyo:
"While the analog-to-digital video conversion is overall a nice feature for convenience, there are a couple of quirks on the TX-SR605. For example, those planning to use the TX-SR605 with 1080i signals via a component video input will be disappointed to find out that all 1080i signals via component are downconverted to 720p when output over the HDMI output. Furthermore, 1080p signals via the component video input cannot be output via the HDMI output at all. There are certainly work-arounds for these issues--see our Tips & Tricks section--but they involve complications that HDMI-equipped receivers were supposed to avoid."

The same can be said about the H/K unit. Although Onkyo's site claims 480p upscaling and not 720p upscaling like the H/K has, I would confirm that prior to making a plunge on the Onkyo.

 

[jcPanny]

HT ideas

Don't waste money on the Monster cables. Check out Monoprice or Bluejeans and put the savings in your speaker budget.

Also, for about $240 you can get an HD-DVD player for movies and use the x-box for gamming.

I am not too familar with those in-wall speakers, but there are also on-wall speakers that mount flush to the wall like these from Axiom and most bookshelf speakers can be wall mounted with a bracket.
http://www.axiomaudio.com/wallspeakers.html

Don't limit your options unless it is an asthetic requirement.