Today’s newest Surround Sound or Home Theater receivers are better than ever and getting less expensive to get what you really need. That is a unit which is reliable, sounds great and has the correct features; features such as 5.1- 7.2 sound capability, USB input/charging, HDMI switching, and most importantly ease of use. Systems which host a complete home sound system that has speakers on the back patio and or throughout the entire home will require a unit which has the capability to drive the speakers in the main system and be able to drive the house speakers simultaneously.

Often, however, I prefer to use a separate stereo-only receiver to drive these “house” speakers because the operation of one unit running 2 areas can be difficult for some people to grasp. It may seem more logical to address one unit for the main room sound and address another unit for the rest of the speakers in the home.

Sony, Yamaha, Onkyo and Denon are the brands I would most always prefer; these brands are the industry standards and I would always stick with a major name brand product. Keep in mind the space available (depth being a large concern) as today’s cabinets are more compact. And depth is often around 15 inches of clear space. Having a receiver or any other device that measures more than about 12 inches deep becomes nearly impossible to place without cutting out the rear of the cabinet, or jamming it into a space and finding out you now have either unhooked or broken connectors to deal with.

Operating a system like this should be simple:

On the remote which runs your cable or sat system, press power –ON-. All items turn on and are already on the correct input because you shut the system off in a working state. And pressing –OFF- will cause all units to shut themselves off. It really does not get any simpler than that. The idea that you need to buy an additional remote to do this is, in my opinion, not a good idea. There are only a couple of fundamentals to making a system work:
1- Are all needed components on (TV- Surround receiver- Cable or Blu-ray or Roku type)?
2- Is the TV on the correct input?- It should be because it never changes
3- Is the Surround receiver on the correct input? It will say right on the front of it “SAT/Cable” for instance.

Following these simple rules will always make your system work.
Good luck and great sound!