Have a room and $30k need advice.

[jocko_nc]

Love the Home Depot 12 awg wire recommendation... You could go with Lowes, too.

For long runs of preamp-level signal, I'm using RG-6 quad shield and fittings from Parts Express to built up custom assemblies. They seem to work quite well. Did I mention cost-effective?

Don't let them sell you $4000.00 of MonsterStuff.

jocko

[jocko_nc]

I hope I don't get sued for copyright infringement for that "MonsterStuff" quip...

[jc_ufl]

I think most of the guys have given great advice. Room treatments are essential for good sound and calibration is very important! Hopefully you have a direction in mind to begin your research. Keep us updated with your progress and if you meet with an installer, let us know how it went. Good luck and have fun shopping!

[Grandpaw]

I would like to start out by saying that there are many at this forum that have forgotten more about audio than I know. Having said that I am going to chime in and give you my two cents worth of opinion anyway.

First of all giving a budget to the people on the forum that you are asking for advice from is totally different from giving a salesperson a budget. If you give the salesman a budget that will be his or her's starting point and you will probably here "for this much more you could step up to this system". The object is to get what sutes your needs and to get the most bang for the buck you can get.

1st The way I would approach this project is to give the people here a budget and ask for advice, which you have already done. Then I would do follow up research on the advice you were given.

2nd. I would take several pictures and locate as many professional home theater businesses as possible and show them the pictures, tell them what you are trying to accomplish and ask for different systems that might meet your needs. As you are shown each different level of systems make notes of the differences and what is important to you and come back here for more advice. If they will come out to your house to talk with you first hand so much the better.

I would want it explained to me why each system is better than the other so you could develop some idea what is important to you. In the process of learning about each system I would think you could narrow it down to a few to choose from. At the point you get an idea about what you think might fit your needs come back here and list your choices and ask for further advice.

You may find out that you don't need to spend your entire budget or you may find out that spending a little more will reap big rewards. The only way I can see to find this out is to explore the differences between each level of system. Once you get the basic level of system decided on you can always fine tune it with information you might receive here.

This is how I would go about this kind of project no matter what your budget was, Jeff