Combining home theater with two channel

Get 2 monoblock amps for your R1's and a mono amp for your center speaker.

That is what I'm doing. Model 12's monoblocks for my floor standers and a model 201 for my center speaker. All through a Classe SSP-800. 

Gave away multi channel altogether and have never missed it. The same money spent on 2 channel yields much better results.

Yes. But you can have both. 

Buy a great preamp and use 2 balanced interconnects to connect it to your processors front XLR's.

Then use the preamp for 2 channel or pass through from your processor for 5.1 surround. Win!

I know it sounds like hokum but it is not.  For me, full HT is less important than sound quality.  So I am going the two channel route for TV and movie streaming.   I find that it is more than adequate for HT duties. But now music streaming is so much better.   

I have a NAD C368 and Bluesound node 2i streaming Tidal MQA. I have a PS Audio S300 power amplifier that had been in use with the AVR. Speakers are Revel Performa F206.

The TV source is Apple 4k via HDMI and then audio out to the NAD via optical out.  It works very well in my small listening room.  The room is filled with the HT sound. 
It took me the best part of Covid to come to the realization that I needed to shift my point of view. I am sure you can work something out with your deal so that you can demo the preamp/integrated in your house. 

And while you are laying around you can always have some fun and try switching to a two channel set up. You would have everything you would need.

It is a paradigm shift but is well worth trying out to see if it might be an option. 

Have fun!!

I just purchased the parasound JC 5 stereo amplifier and the JC 2Bp pre amp to add to my HT. I hope it’s worth the money I spent . In the beginning, one can waste a lot of money on this hobby because of plain old ignorance ,but im learning. thanks to site like this one im getting a better understanding. Thank you all for your help.