Like others have said, you should be able to get a HK AVR 235 for $350. I just did at jr.com - after I auditioned a 3480 and decided I liked the sound of the 235 better even for stereo. The HK seems to have better DACs (digital to analog converters) than my <$100 CD player. Also, some friends of mine just upgraded to a Yamaha HTR 5740 AV receiver and it make their old DVD player come alive because we connected it throught the optical toslink connection and used the DACs in the receiver. So, unless you have a DVD/CD player that definitely has better DACs than the HK AVR 235 (or 230 if you can find one - you can get them really cheap) I would say there is no downside to going with the AVR. In stereo the 235 puts out 65 watts, but HK rates their receivers very conservatively (the 235 has significantly more power than the 100 wpc Yamaha) so power isn't really an issue if you stay with HK.
