Home theater setup recommendations?


My daughter, married, middle aged, has asked me to help them set up a decent home theater/listening room in their new home. I've been an audiophile since the 70's......before I even heard the term, so I'm a pretty competent 2 channel guy and I understand room acoustics............That said, I never really ventured into HT. I simply went with my 2 channel rig and was perfectly happy with things that way.....still am.

I guess my questions are..........How  important is multi-channel for movies vs audio.............dumb question, I'm sure, but it's not my area, so I'm asking...............and any recommendations for a decent, not UBER, sound system primarily for movies. They're willing to spend some money to get a nice setup, but not the kind of coin that many here likely would. I'm thinking used gear, speakers, subs, receiver or amps. Something that will sound good, but not require a second mortgage..................These folks think that hanging 4 inch Bose speakers in the corners of the room with a micro, wanna-be sub is good sound..............I want to "enlighten" them..........thanks
shadowcat2016
Here is our take on how to do this please take this guidance for what you wish, 30 years of professional audio/home theater design including designing a Home Theater for Rev Run’s Home, check out DIY network Rev Run’s Renovation Season 2 episode 9 Secret Cinema.

1: For surround sound yes multi channel sound is what is what will recreate the experience of being in the action, many people don’t like multi channel music as it tends to sound gimicky
2: The quality of the receiver or electronics really matters. If you are trying to get the best bang for the buck use a high end receiver.
3: Stick to the Audiophile brands, NAD, Primare, Arcam/Audio Control they really do sound better, and put their money into better circuits and conversely are easier to use and setup vs the mass market Japanese brands which tend to feature useless surround sound modes like Cathederal and others, All you need it Dolby Digital and DTS for most codecs.
4: Choose speakers that will work for both music and theater, that means a matching center channel and so the look and size of the center channel which may be under the TV and visible may be important as you must have the room for the speaker. Choose floorstanders as they sound best for music, with a small speaker and sub combo doesn't sound nearely as seemless for music but works for TV, the more bass the fronts have the easier it is to blend with a subwoofer. 
5: The rears can be of another brand than the fronts and in ceiing speakers if you can install them work great for rear surrounds.

It is best if you can use the same speakers or same brands all around but the rear effects speakers are for mostly effects so any difference sonically will be less noticable. If a speaker for the fronts use metal dome tweeters then seek the same for the rears.
6: Especially for music put the majority of the budget into the main left and right speakers, so if you have to economize use cheaper backs and forgo the subwoofer which can be added later.

7: If you are going to use a subwoofer, most home owners do not want giant subwoofers, so stick with Rel, Jl Audio, Paradigm, SVS.

The new Paradigm Dominator series offers a very high performance subwoofer, with state of the art bass correction and a very useful app and they sound great for music and theater, we just put out the 10inch $1,000.00 woofer and it is very impressive.

For louspeakers the Kef R series can be formidable loudspeakers especially for theater, the speakers use a dual concentric driver that puts the tweeter inside the woofer which acts like a mini horn this creates a very wide soundstage with very little localization.

Many dealers are now selling older R for 50% off with full warranty, we have a set of R700 which were $3,800 now for $1,900.00 a pair add in a center for $500 and you have almost $5,000.00 worth of speakers for $2,400.00

Other good speakers for Home Theater are Golden Ear Triton’s which have good bass with built in subs, howerver they are very ugly and sound better for theater then music.

Step one is to figure out a budget a cheapie 5 speaker sub/receiver package starts at around $3k a much better theater is $5-10k

So one of the things you may want to do is to actually audition a system so if you can get to a good dealer that would be our recommendation.

Most dealers often have demo or display products that they can sell you to rival the prices found here with the added benefit of having a warrranty and support.

Please feel free to reach out to us if you have any further questions.

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ
Budget?

Are they going to let you make all the decisions?  Do they want to be involved in the decisions or are they simply going to delegate everything to you?

At least until you have a budget as a minimum it is going to be tough to make selections.
Following up from my prior post and adhering to those principles, here is a system I put together for my brother's friend who was in a similar situation and was also ready to check the dreaded "Bose" default option.  He wasn't willing to deal with the used market, so I stuck to direct sellers and heavily discounted items (all with very good reviews) to keep the cost down.  The whole shebang cost about $2500 (plus cables, but I just used some old ones I had hanging around), and after getting it set up and dialed in he was totally blown away by the results.  And I have to say even I was shocked at the level of performance for that amount of money.  I'd bet your daughter would be absolutely thrilled by it as well if she considers Bose good.  Here are the speakers, sub, and receiver he bought...

https://www.aperionaudio.com/collections/open-box-closeout-speakers/products/open-box-intimus-5t-tow...

https://www.aperionaudio.com/collections/intimus-speakers/products/intimus-5c-center-channel-speaker...

https://www.aperionaudio.com/collections/intimus-speakers/products/intimus-4b-satellite-speaker-pair...

https://www.svsound.com/products/sb-2000

https://www.accessories4less.com/make-a-store/item/yamrxa870bl/yamaha-rx-a870-7.2-ch-x-100-watts-net...

I chose a Yamaha receiver for him because they get high ratings for sound, are fairly user friendly, and have been very reliable (many other brands that sound good have very spotty reliability records).  As a prior poster mentioned, I myself would be sorely tempted to buy a used Anthem MRX710, but used it's still more than double the price of the above Yamaha that sounded great when I heard it.  I'm sure the Anthem would sound even better, but that'd be up to you (and the budget) if they'd appreciate the difference.  I own the same sub myself, and despite being a sealed box design it can literally shake my fairly large family room with movies but is quick and tight enough to blend with music too -- and it's not very big, which is really nice.  It goes down to an honest 20Hz and feels every bit of it.  Anyway...

As someone mentioned above, I have no idea of the size of the room, budget, etc. so I wouldn't presume to think this would be the right system for your daughter.  I'm just throwing something out there that I found to work well so hoping it just gives you some ideas for your situation.  Best of luck. 
Wow, lots of help and suggestions..............much appreciated folks. I learn more every day..........40 years, two channel audiophile, but the HT thing will be new ground. Lots of similarities, but important differences as well.

Daughter is in Florida, I'm in Maryland, so it will be a field trip for me to do this, which is fine. 

I'll be the one buying the gear and doing the setup since they have no idea where to start. They'd likely just go to Best Buy, get whatever was on sale that day, stick everything in corners and think they'd done good..........ugh.........Always fun spending other peoples $$$.

My impression is that that this will be a dedicated room, so aesthetics should be less of a concern than in multi-use rooms. That will give me some leeway to do it properly. Decent gear and some appropriate acoustic treatment should provide them with a new experience they'll be very happy with.

 I did check out the Master Switch article that was recommended..............good stuff, 

Thanks folks