I'll second the THX thing. It's great to have a standard for sure, and it's a good standard to reach for. But the fact is that most quality receivers match that standard even if the manufacturer won't pay the price to have their receivers certified. Some manufacturers feel they need to pay the price on the theory that they will recoup their investment due to whatever marketing cache THX gives them. Just like the iPod accessory vendors that pay Apple for the right to put the "Made for iPod" logo on their merch.
Really, all you have to do is read about the THX specs and compare them to the specs of the receiver(s) you are
considering. That will tell you what you want to know.
As far as video switching, I like it. Do I need 3 or 4 HDMI inputs? Considering I have no components that push HDMI, no. When HD-DVD has more than 2 available titles and there are more than a handful of HD channels on air I will start to worry about HDMI. Right now I don't feel it necessary. I don't want to be a "bleeding-edge" guinea pig paying the early adopter tax on tech that just doesn't deliver the variety of content my current setup can. Not that it what's available doesn't look great, but there's not enough available to make the kind of capital expenditure it would take to update my entire setup.
