High End system sounding Terrible????

Many years ago when I started the journey, I was using NAD amp and CD player in a two-channel system and liked the sound; when I upgraded from NAD to Arcam amp and CD player, I noticed more resolution as well as dynamic, however, the sound became very bright; and I have been on the upgrade path ever since.

I think your first bet is to follow the advice of onemug. Oftentimes, the set between HT receiver and sub limits the sub's output to x.1st channel, and in 2ch, it is left out, which will, as Shadorne notes, produce an imbalance like what you seem to be hearing.

i went out and started with ok rotel 1098 decided i dont like the 5.1 sound thinking about keeping rotel pre and just do 2 chan through it sound fair hooked to 1095 amp hooked up amp to accuphase v200 circa 1987 the sound is nite and day try simple hook up good luck

I second all the great feedback you've received above. Check out the SUB and speaker configuration in the AVR300. The 'direct' mode sounds best as has been pointed out above. In addition (I owned an AVR300 shortly after it went on the market), I found the ARCAM sound to be very dynamic and resolving but far too bright as several people have pointed out above. I found it necessary to go into the System Trims/Adjustments menu and trim the overall Treble setting for the AVR300 by -2db. This improved both HT and 2-channel to the point where I could listen to it as my speakers at the time had ribbon super-tweeters and the 0db setting on the AVR300 resulted in ear fatigue to say the least.

If you want a more natural sounding HT surr/proc, try Sherbourn PT-7010a (a steal a low price), Outlaw, Anthem (D2) or Classe SSP-300 and SSP-600.

The best overall route as others have said is to have a separate 2-channel pre-amp for your music listening.

Have you considered a 2 channel tube buffer/preamp