Scottht,
You said:
"Honestly, I think I might even be at the point where I might even go without surround speakers. It is just not that important to me right now."
AMEN TO THAT, BROTHER! I'll go ahead and open myself up to being flamed by joining you in THAT sentiment. Now, please understand that I have absolutely nothing against people who enjoy this kind of thing, AND I do NOT claim that my MY taste is the "correct" taste, but personally, I've never really understood the fascination with having sound emanate from BEHIND one's head. At any live musical performance, the sound comes from in FRONT, on a STAGE, hence the term, "soundstage." At a movie, even one in "Dolby Surround" the PICTURE is still in the FRONT, on the screen. When I've been to movies and stuff came out of the side speakers, it has usually sounded FAKE. In theaters, the sound is often "big", and seems artificially "overdynamic" ("too MUCH highs, too MUCH lows, don't know--or even care--whether it's Bose..."). To me, this sort of thing is very annoying, gimmicky, and insulting to my intelligence. (Others may disagree, and that's fine. I could easily be "wrong.")
When I went to upgrade the stereo, my wife and I were both in agreement that a surround sound system was not in the cards (yes, really, and we still are, I swear!). One big negative (aside from the above) was the idea of dealing with the cable runs, which would have had to be either across or under the floor, or along or within the walls.
The system we have is hooked up such that the speakers and sub-bass unit can be used as the audio for movies and television. Having GOOD speakers and electronics, the result of doing this was surprisingly cool (highly excellent, in fact) when we tried it about a week or two ago, and we've been doing it that way intermittently ever since. I have a 12-year-old son who used to avoid going to movies that were overly "loud." I never thought that he'd want big stereo sound with the TV. We hooked up the Intuitive Design Summits through the Odyssey's and supplemented with the Rel sub bass unit, just like the two channel setup, except without the benefit of the DAC (obviously). It was astonishingly good, and, to me at least, seemed more "realistic" than, say, a movie theater would. For example, he was watching that same movie through the stereo while I was in a different room. While the dialogue was on, I called in to his older brother for some reason, because they were talking over the movie. His brother didn't answer (he's a teenager), so I got up and went into the living room, where they were watching the movie. When I got there, his brother was nowhere to be found. It had been the movie dialogue sounding that realistic! To me, that's a MUCH better experience than artificial high end sizzle (minus the refined accuracy) and artificial low end boom.
The point: Maybe you could hook your television up to your two channel unit and get a result that meets or even exceeds your expectations, and it would be FREE! (Or maybe not--maybe you'll think that this idea stinks.)
Bill
