Amp/Speaker selection help.

Ultraviolet is right on the money. Speaking from personal experience, I bought one of those home theater in a box deals and regret it now. I should have done it in steps and started out with quality components. Do your research and you should have a great home theater system!

That is sound advice. There is a thread on Audiogon with members opining that 2 channel is best for movies, which is a load of excrement in my opinion. These same people will tell you that the idea of 2 channel music is to recreate the live event (even if it was a studio recording). Why then, I must ask, would you not want the sound for movies to recreate the theater experience????

Ok, I'm diving back in. While I agree that 5.1 for movies is vastly superior to 2 channel, I would advise doing it in a stepwise fashion, or, at the very least, don't let the two channel audio get pushed to the backburner by getting some boxed ready-to-go 5.1 setup. If you happen to be the only person ever to step foot in these forums with self-control when it comes to budgeting for audio and $2500-3000 is your absolute limit, I'd do this: Set a $200 max on surround speakers, pick up a beefy receiver used and try to limit it to under $1000 (which will get you quite a bit in a used receiver). Cambridge Soundworks has very inexpensive center speakers which really aren't all that bad for dialogue--used, easily under $100. Spend the rest on the front pair of speakers. With your budget and criteria, this will provide you with the best 2 channel possible and I really don't think your movie experience will suffer at all. In addition, if (who are we kidding...when) you decided to upgrade, replacing the surrounds or the center won't be a hard hit and you will have a solid base (your front speakers) to build off of.

For what it's worth, this is the route I took at the beginning. A decent receiver ($800 new--I didn't know about used audio then), $1500 Vienna Acoustic Bachs, $250 Cambridge Soundworks Center (Used, sub $100 now), $200 Boston Acoustic dipole surrounds. It was really quite entertaining for movies and sweet sounding for two channel all things considered.

I agree with Ultraviolet. Smallish floorstanders take up no more room than monitors on proper stands. If, however, you intend to place the speakers in a home entertainment cabinet on a shelf, in my opinion you might as well resign yourself to the fact that you will not achieve great sound for music only. At least make sure that you get a front ported design. There are alot of these out there from Monitor Audio, B&W, Paradigm etc... Given your price range for processing, amplification and speakers, I do not disagree with the AVR suggestion. Just do yourself a favor and assume future upgrades will come. If you get a receiver, make sure it has pre outs for at least amplifiers. After all, if you know of this website, you're already doomed to a course of constant upgrades and changes.

If you are going to be using it for movies mostly, (and audio as a secondary use), I recommend getting a good HT receiver. There are lots of them out there that can work for both home theater as well as audio. This will allow you the maximum flexibility, and it will have the DTS, Dolby Digital and THX decoding that you will need should you ever decide to upgrade to a full blown 5.1 (or better) surround sound system. It can also serve, (temporarily, until you can afford to get a good stereo system), as an amp for listening to music.

My recommendation, and I know I buck most peoples opinion on this site, is that you should not try to combine audio and video, at least not in the price range you are in. (I also think that listening to movies in two channels is not nearly as good as listening in 5.1 - again, I am going against most people on this site, as least according to one of the threads started recently.)

(I have a decent HT receiver, a Denon 3802. However, it is not really all that great for audio, or at least it is not in the realm of what I consider to be high end. I can use it to listen to music, but only casually, not seriously.)

I also recommend you stick with SS, as it is less tweaky than tubes, and since you want to use it mostly for movies, you will probably want decent power and really good bass. Don't forget that you'll need an integrated amp, not just a power amp (or else you will need a preamp too.)

If you really want monitor type speakers, the M&K speakers are relatively inexpensive and yet are accurate and can play loud. (However, I consider them to be more for HT use, rather than for stereo use. I use the K7's and K4's in my system.)

My two cents on this matter mostly boils down to this:
If you are going to listen to movies, do it right and get a 5.1 surround sound HT setup.
If you are going to listen to music, do it right and dedicate a stereo for that alone.
These are, of course, my opinions. However, I know that most of my friends share them as well.

Good Luck in your quest!

Ultraviolet,

Point taken. Can anyone suggest a good pair of floorstanders with a small footprint?

Rob

Just a general suggestion regarding your decision to go with monitors--I would strongly consider floor standers. You will still need a base for the monitors and there are plenty of floorstanders that will give you far better sound (especially for the dynamics of movies) and take up the same footprint on your floor. If you're really starved for space/cash and can't get a subwoofer then I think the monitors would be an even bigger mistake. I'll leave it to others for specific suggestions.