It's all good, indeed...
It is funny however. I've sold maggie 1.6's for years, and the last thing that would ever likely come to my mind for ANY serious home theater speaker would be MAGGIES!!! I've yet to hear a Magnapan HT system I thought sounded impressive or dynamic enough...even at low volumes! While they are indeed capable of transparent(although not dynamically transparent) sound, they aren't exactly what any professional audio reviewers are using in their systems for HT dubties! This would give me pause if I were trying to build an effective HT system from scratch! I do think dynamic loudspeakers do a better job in this regard mostly. The Maggies really don't handle heavy dynamic stuff so well, and are more of a delicate music speaker in my experience. Infact, I'd say limited application is about right for those.
I suppose you could build a "pretty sounding" system with those. But then dynamic involvement and authority would suffer as well, especially if you listen at even moderate levels rather than soft volume levels. They tend to be low efficiency/sensitivity speakers also, which doesn't help dynamic agility one bit either!
I just came from seeing X-Men 2 at the local I-Max theater. And the dynamics and power these movies carry are indeed awesome!..they surely give sound systems a testing dynamically! If I remember right, I've known of more than a few occassions that we've blown ribbon drivers out of the Maggie's by simply moving them to quickly into possition!!! We've also played em a bit too hard with some rock at times and caused some failures there as well. I do notice that heavy dynamic stuff really ain't there strong suit.
If I absolutely had to use the Maggie's for HT dubties, I strongly recommend playing them as "small", with lots of high current amplification! Receivers need not apply for "Maggie-dubty!!!"...Simply not enough current there, let alone refinement. They'll need all the help they can get. Still, I have my doubts about what they can do for HT.
My recommendations to people who like these speakers for music at least, is that they consider using a SEPARATE system for their movies! small SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED HT satalite speakers mounted on the walls would be a much more effective speaker for what movie mixes have to offer I think. I'd keep the Maggie's in place for 2 channel, and maybe run the other speakers around the room for HT..just keeping the 2 systems separate.
IF you do end up with the Magnapans, just remember that music is their strong suit, and certainly not Techo, rap, hard rock, heavy percussion, and especially HT! So, if none of that's a priority for you, you'll be the better for it. But then again I'm a big action movie buff...maybe lots of poeple here in this forum are into more "Sleepless in Seattle" movie watching by-enlarge...in which case I could see Delicate Maggie's doing better here.
Good luck
