I need to buy a complete system.

re room treatment. I sympathise: we live in a modernist house that was designed for us, with enormous glass windows, a pretty minimalist interior and hard floors. If your situation is only a bit comparable, you will need to do something to dampen the reflections in the mid and high frequency range if you want to avoid listening fatigue. Fortunately, elegant and clean modern technical solutions do exist, perhaps to be combined with a large rug.

If you don't need the video you obviously save some money that you could use to get e.g a beefy Bryston power amplifier.

mhsmith,

     I think your room is a good fit for the Swarm Distributed Bass Array for a few reasons:
1.  Having 4 medium-to-small subs strategically dispersed throughout your large room would provide throughout your entire large space.
2.  There's no need for any microphones, room analyzing software, equalization, digital signal processing or room treatments whatsoever.  A very good fit for your requirements.

Tim

I agree that the Audiokinesis Swarm system is a very interesting option. If I were living in the US I would certainly give it a very hard look, as it addresses precisely the biggest issue with the reproduction of low frequencies.
However, I am sure digital room equalization such as by the DSpeaker Antimode 8033 or their forthcoming X4 could add additional benefits.
As for room treatments, I think it is important to distinguish between two fundamentally different kinds. The first is to deal with room modes below the Schroeder frequency, and involves big and inelegant bass traps. The second is to deal with chaotic reflections above the Schroeder frequency and involves damping material of various kinds, rugs, book cases etc.
The Swarm system addresses the first kind, below the Schroeder frequency, but not the second. Given the hard floor of the OP's house, he may still have to do something about that.

Hi willemj,

     Good points, I agree with everything you said.  Since installing a Swarm 4 sub solution in my system, I've found exactly what you stated to be true:  the Swarm takes care of the bass in the room without the need for large bass room treatments. I haven't found a need for room equalization or dsp but will reserve judgement on whether that may be of even further benefit until I give it a try.  And, true, that just leaves the more predictable mid-range and treble frequencies above the Shroeder frequency to get right in the room via speaker positioning and strategic room treatments.
     I now consider system installation as a 2-step process; 1st getting the bass right in the room and then getting everything above the bass right in the room.  
    I think mhsmith would find this approach very suitable in his large room, as well.

Thanks,
  Tim

http://www.libertyaudio.com

A complete package - from its maker

Good Listening

Peter