I am building a home theater and have received my epic 80 system. I chose the EP500 sub and will be running a 5.1 system in a room that is 14 x 16 x 8 (I know, it'll be rockin'!). Most of my use will be for movies and TV, with maybe 10-20% music listening and concert viewing.
The local (Northern Virginia) hi-fi store guy will be doing my prewiring and projector set-up. He deals in the above brands, plus some higher end stuff (B&K, etc) that is over my budget. My budget is flexible but I'm eyeing the USD$1000-1500 range. I could stretch this to $2000 for the Arcam AVR300.
I lugged my M80s and VP150 into the store and auditioned a Marantz receiver and thought it sounded really nice - I guess it is called "warm". I heard some Arcam separates which have some of the same hardware as the AVR300.
Can anyone share their experiences over the long term with any of these receivers?
