OK, so I was going to look at these systems for my father in law as well. We've already got all the wiring installed from their remodel over the summer. I was looking at a Nuvo system. In the interim, I had them get a Sonos.
But now you can do it relatively cheaply if you're willing to use powered speakers. Have a PC/Mac running iTunes, a few Airport Expresses, an iPod Touch or iPhone with the Remote app, and run Airtunes. You can stream from different iTunes libraries to different Airport Expresses in your house. All of them can be controlled via Wifi on an iPod Touch/iPhone. I use this with my Macs and AppleTV at home. Works great, plus it's relatively cheap. You can even hook up the Airport Express to your existing AV rack. The only downside is that the speakers do need to be powered.
