Back when I was dreaming about this stuff—couldn’t wait for the latest issue of Hi-Fi News & Record Review, devoted to The Audio Critic as noted elsewhere—I was a medical resident and then cardiology fellow, which meant I couldn’t afford anything expensive.
I always had a Jones for the Quad ESL’s—I heard them at a hi-fi show in San Francisco in high school, and they eclipsed every other speaker I ever heard. But then my hearing was still good at that point.
By the time I finished training and was in practice I was a family man with three kids, and although my wife appreciates classical music and has a good ear (could easily distinguish the LS3/5A’s from my old Dynaco speakers), I couldn’t really go for the upscale stuff. My stuff was pretty much B-C level on the Stereophile scale.

It sounds like you are happy with how your current setup does movies. My suggestion would be to keep your existing speakers for movies then, and find room in your budget for a pair of great-sounding stereo speakers and run them as a 'B' channel on your new receiver when listening to music.

Reason being, I'm not a big fan of the N.1/N.2 approaches for critical music listening/audiophile setups, and here are my reasons.

Issue #1: introduction of extra electronic processing, and artifacts

For movies, the sound engineers create the signals expressly for multichannel and surround sound setups do great work on that kind of content. And N.1/N.2 systems can sound good/great on that source material, no argument there.

But that's not what sound engineers do to produce source material for music. That they mix in the studio, listening to monitor speakers, to produce two channels. (Well, except for the brief bygone days of quadrophonic..).

So, when given two-channel material, the signal processing in the receiver uses its circuitry and algorithms to chew on the two-channel music signal and create signals for side/back/ambiance speakers. This is not always done well, and even when it is done well, the effects can be audible, and in any event are different than what the sound engineers intended in the studio.

Issue #2: Speaker design

Generally (but not always) the design/engineering of multichannel speakers is done for non-acoustic constraints: side speakers needing to be small and lightweight to be wall-mountable, middle front speakers needing to fit under a TV, etc. Ask yourself why great-sounding stereo speakers without size constraints aren't the size of multimedia satellite speakers. Answer is, if great sound were truly possible in those sizes, all speakers would be that size for cost reasons. And, they're not. Physics and acoustics matter, so size matters and forms a constraint.

Issue #3: aesthetics of having music coming from all around, all the time

There are times when a surround effect might be what just you might want - e.g. live concert material, where the walls would add reverberation if you were there in person. OTOH, with some other sound material, this effect might be disconcerting. Listening to a studio recording of, say Simon and Garfunkel vocals with a lot of rear reverb would be, IMO, just wrong. So you would probably want to be able to turn off the back/side channels for some music, taking extra effort on your part. And, often, the receivers offer a 'music' setting that turns off the side/back channels...which does remove the reverb effect, but then, all your music comes from just a couple of the small speakers up front.

So, for music, I'm a believer in two great speakers up front, rather than a plethora of small satellites.

quote:

Ended up with Yamaha TSR-700 from Costco on sale for $329 (regular $399). It is a renamed for Costco RX-V6A. 7.1.2, HDMI, Dolby Atmos, yada, yada, yada. The RX-V6A goes for $599, so that is a pretty good deal.

One of the best deals in AV there is.
I just saw this a few days ago:

Tgrshrk99: For great-sounding L-R speakers that are small, cheap and well-reviewed, I recommend ELAC Debut 2.0 B6.2 at <$300 a pair. I have these at home and at our condo and am very pleased.

Unfortunately, The TSR-700 is out of stock at Costco.

I like the idea of a separate pair of speakers for the B channel. Recommendations on a good place to read up on good speakers for this use? My music is a combination of vinyl, CDs and digital, if that matters.

quote:

Originally posted by cne32507:
Tgrshrk99: For great-sounding L-R speakers that are small, cheap and well-reviewed, I recommend ELAC Debut 2.0 B6.2 at <$300 a pair. I have these at home and at our condo and am very pleased.

Recommended those to a friend and he's been over the top pleased with them. They're on floor stands he built for them.

quote:

Originally posted by Tgrshrk99:
Unfortunately, The TSR-700 is out of stock at Costco.

Might be a blessing in disguise. After finding the specs to be darned good for this price point, I did a bit more research. Depending on your planned usage, there are some problems like the 2.1 HDMI chipset in that unit.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/j...bug/?sh=4e7655713527
Yamaha Confirms Its Latest AVRs Suffer HDMI Bug That Impacts Xbox Series X And RTX 30 Gaming

Bottom line is to do your due diligence in researching prospective acquisitions.

quote:

Originally posted by Tgrshrk99:
Recommendations on a good place to read up on good speakers for this use? My music is a combination of vinyl, CDs and digital, if that matters.

Forgot to respond to this earlier. Check out:
https://www.avsforum.com/forums/speakers.89/
https://www.audiosciencereview...m/index.php?reviews/

Had seen avsforum, but not audio science review. Thanks very much - looks like a great site.

quote:

Originally posted by Tgrshrk99:
Unfortunately, The TSR-700 is out of stock at Costco.

I like the idea of a separate pair of speakers for the B channel. Recommendations on a good place to read up on good speakers for this use? My music is a combination of vinyl, CDs and digital, if that matters.

Out of stock online, but they sell it in stores as well. My local store had a pallet of them when I was there last weekend.

Check local store if you have one.

quote:

Originally posted by bald1:

quote:

Originally posted by Tgrshrk99:
Unfortunately, The TSR-700 is out of stock at Costco.

Might be a blessing in disguise. After finding the specs to be darned good for this price point, I did a bit more research. Depending on your planned usage, there are some problems like the 2.1 HDMI chipset in that unit.

...

Bottom line is to do your due diligence in researching prospective acquisitions.

I don’t own a gaming box so no issue for my use. I am sure the problem will be sorted out eventually with a firmware update.

Most would probably not call my setup a true home theatre system, but I'm in the Hobbs' camp...

I have an LG Smart TV, and use the Sonos system. We simply use the PlayBar, Sub, and 2 of the Play:3 speakers for the rear. I also have several of the older Play:1 speakers scattered throughout the house...bathroom, office, etc.

We use it for everything...TV, Spotify, radio, etc. The sound and the quality are plenty good enough for me to appreciate.