Newbie audio questions

[Intamin]

Originally Posted by ts0323

Great, that really helps, thanks.
I got a few more questions. Is there any way to get decent speakers plus a receiver for $500? I don't really want to go the HTIB route, but I'm 16 and I don't have a whole lot of money.
Also, will any old receiver accept TrueHD and DTS-HD and all of that?

Reciever and speakers for 500? Yes, very carefully if you watch the deals and what not, but I'm guessing it'd be slightly over that budget, but the quality would/should be much improved over an htib. You could do a Polk, Onkyo, ED-sub for close to that budget which is pretty much the standard entry level set up, or go the used route (ebay or http://www.audiogon.com) and look for good bookshelf or floorstanders-brands that I would look for that would have something in your price range would be: Polk, Monitor Audio, Klipsch, Paradigm, Def-tech, Energy, Dynaudio (probably a stretch for the budget, but there is a pair of bookshelves on Agon for 300), and B&W (I'm sure I'm forgetting a few, but there are a lot of options out there that I bet you'll be happy with). Listen to what you can locally, and you should be able to find reviews of pretty much all of those speaker brands online if you can't find them locally (Oh, and don't be intimidated to go listen locally even if you're 16. Your money is the same as everyone else's.). For receivers that accept TrueHD and DTS-HD, most nowadays are starting to have that standard I believe. I know there is an Onkyo for $300 that does 5.1 out and decodes both codecs.