Can anyone beat this setup from bestbuy at $1000??

Nice system... if I had that kind of money I would get it.

I would buy the speakers and sub separately and get a receiver + dvd with hdmi for a couple of hundred more becuase the 50 plasma deserves it.

I picked up the same deal tonight. I have a 42 inch panny. I have yet to set it up because its late. The 10 inch sub is what blew me away in the store.

cant say I was all that impressed with the quintets, IMO, youd be better getting some bookshelves like some of those boston acoustics ones going for cheap on 1call maybe a BIC H100 and a refiurb reciever from shoponkyo

Agreed. I have a refurb onkyo 6.1 (520, I think) that I got from shoponkyo for $99, shipped ( I have a Yamaha RX-V2600 at home, but it blows the 1k budget.). The thing was pretty much brand new when I got it! Pair it with some Bostons on clearance at oncall and add the DVD player of your choice and it will be sweet.

If you want to go with the sub/sat route, see if you can snag a Boston Avidea 6.1 system with 10"sub from AA and you'll be blown away with what $199+shipping can get you on clearance.

BTW - if you go with the Avideas and don't mind a quick mod with a soldering iron, you can get away with an Outlaw Model 970 b-stock for $649 paired with the Boston Avidea 770 speakers from Audio Advisor for about $250 shipped and you'll have $150 left over to get the disc player of your choice. the Avidea comes with a 200 watt subwoofer with built-in amps for the 6 included satellites (with extruded aluminum satellites!). Both of these have factory warranties and a high-quality systems to boot. the only setback is that you'll have to use DVI to HDMI cables to pass digital video to your display.

I've never been a fan of small satellite speakers... I've heard the original Quintets and was not impressed... not sure how the revisions have affected the sound.

If I were looking for an entire setup for $1000 I'd go with ACOUSTIC RESEARCH ARVP600 mains ($150/pr), ACOUSTIC RESEARCH ARXP242C center ($59/ea), ACOUSTIC RESEARCH ARXP62 surrounds ($99/pr), DAYTON SUB-120 12" 150w Subwoofer ($150), Onkyo SR604 Receiver ($330), and Oppo Digital DV-970HD scaling DVD player ($150).

For the price these speakers are really hard to beat. Another option would be JBL Venue series... STAGE mains ($260/pr), VOICE center ($100/ea), and ARENA surrounds ($90/pr), and the same sub, receiver, and dvd player.

The AR speakers are all available from J&R (might want to wait until they run another free-shipping special). The JBL speakers are available from B&H Photo. The best legit price on the receiver is from Accessories4less and the sub can be found at partsexpress. The DVD player can be ordered directly from Oppo Digital.

The Oppo & Onkyo will give you a single cable path from DVD to Receiver to Display. It will also leave you ready for HD-DVD, BluRay if you decide to go that route. You'll also have enough HDMI inputs for a DVD/HD-DVD/BluRay player and HD box.

I posted this in another thread but deserves posting here also.

Magnolia Home theater in Atlanta has:

1) Martin Logan Dynamo 10" sub on sale from $700 down to $400 and is a nice small 12" cubed sub.

2) Monitor Audio Bronze Fronts, Surrounds, Center on sale for $700.

So thats a $1100 setup with Subwoofer that will be hard to beat in that price range. Both were on sale as of about 10 days ago until inventory was sold out.

That setup lacks a receiver and DVD... both are included in the BestBuy package.

Like a few others said, the Quintet speakers really aren't very impressive for the price. Compare them side by side with a bookshelf speaker and you will hear the difference.

My suggestion:

Athena AS-C1.2 center channel from audioadvisor.com, $149 + s/h
2 x Athena AS-B1.2 bookshelf pair from audioadvisor.com, $120 + s/h
BIC Acoustech H-100 subwoofer from eBay, $185 best offer + $39 s/h
Refurbished Onkyo TX-SR504 receiver from shoponkyo.com, $169 + s/h

That comes to $783 plus whatever shipping costs on the speakers and the receiver. Should still leave you with a decent amount left for an upconverting DVD player.

Where they the Monitor Audio bookshelf fronts or the Floorstanders? For the $700, I'm guessing they are the bookshelf speakers.

Yes, it was the Monitor Audio Bronze Bookshelfs and the Bronze surround speakers and the Center Broze speaker.

The $700 price tag is for the Bronze series and not the Bronze Reference series.

thanks!!