Home Theater Bypass , why am I hearing this now.

So would your turntable, streamer, etc. be connected to the integrated instead of the AVR?

You know the answer. I have explained many times. HT processors are so bad that even bypass costs you sound quality. Took me roughly two full years trying everything I could to have quality stereo and HT in the same room.

Bottom line, like everything else, it is a compromise. You can have true SOTA stereo, giving up only a tiny little bit you will hardly even notice by having a screen where it would be optimal to have a diffuser. With stereo you will also give up gimmicky surround effects - but this will be more than compensated for by the incredible realism of your enveloping stereo sound stage.

OR you can have crappy stereo with lots of channels of crappy components, because no magic HT wand can change the fact you only have so much money and so divided by two is higher quality than divided by 7.1. Your stereo will suck, and so will your movie soundtracks- only the effects will be better.

But not the bass, since with the stereo the money you didn’t throw away on center and surrounds will buy you a SOTA DBA.

It really is no contest, and this is even before factoring in that let’s face it, you watch movies with your eyes and so are far less critical of sound quality. You listen to music best with your eyes closed, your hearing is ten times better than with movies.

So HT is asking you to spend a fortune on a lot of crap that will never make movies sound good (can’t!) and WILL make music sound worse.

This decision to nix multichannel is the easiest most obvious decision out there- except for the fact all the advertising world has herded all the sheeple into the same pen. Which is close to penitentiary. Where you go for penance. Which is what it feels like listening to music on a system with HT.

How’s that?

I had a highly rated Denon AVR, also McIntosh and Lexicon HT systems, and even at that level of price/quality and the ability to do a 'clean' 2-channel mode, the 2-channel never sounded good compared to a dedicated 2-channel. I agree with Fittebd9, if you can't have separate 2-channel and surround-sound systems. Also, as someone else suggested, having the the two front Left-Right speakers of a much higher quality will also help. I did that which did help a bit.

hi.

i went through this a little while ago. listening room is in living area...

bottom line everything matters. 

for me i got a intergrated amp with ht bypass. 
vitus sia 025. i started with audia flight fl3s.

marantz 7011 avr.

vitus made a huge difference to both movies and music. dac streamer is a ayon s10 signature.

front speakers make a huge difference to both music and HT especially music scores in movies. 

cables made a difference to. i went from canare 4311 and basic rca to purist audio and i will never go back. 

my advice if you are certain your going to chase the best you can afford.

save and replace your weakest link with the best you can afford. rinse a repeat.

enjoy

steve

Digital
I have a Vivaldi stack playing the front 2 speakers via my own made preamp
I have a Bryston sp3 playing simultaneously into the sides and rears (the front L&R are muted). The sp3 splits various signals very well (it is not just surround sound) so I have a whole room experience. 
Analogue
The phono stage goes into the preamp so it goes both into the L&R (as per normal) but then the line in/out goes into the sp3 for signal splitting around the room - as per digital
Sounds great - any knockers will comment with ignorance as they have not heard it