Hi,
I am looking into setting up a surround sound home theater system that can handle 5.1 and 7.1 sound format. For some reason I bought the Sony HTC sound bar system from someone at my work and it does not support 7.1 or rather does it very poorly by adding a lot of echo and almost too much bass.

Also the new setup will be in a bigger room so a sound bar is not really an option.

Sound clarity is more important to me than a loud thump. As for the budget I guess I am hoping not to spend more than 2K. I already have a LCD and a Blue ray player so this is more about the speaker, amp setup.

I am somewhat of a newbie so please do keep that in mind when suggesting any kind of setup

Thanks!!