Good nachos to you.

I finally did it! After maybe... 6 years of pondering? I finally purchased a home theater system. It all started when my older brother created his theater room and populated it with Rockets from av123 and a Definitive sub. As a college student I immediately began researching my dream system (within economic reason of course ). Of course I was directed AVSforum which was a terrible, wonderful thing. After exhausting myself with the possibilities (Aperion, Ascend, Axiom, av123, subwoofers, receivers, etc.) things died down. Maybe once a year I would come back and exhaust myself again.

Now: six years, a wife, a job, a house, and two kids (girls) later I find myself in the position actually to make a purchase... *gasp*!!! Somewhere over the years I had consciously settled on Ascend Acoustics. I like the community, reviews, mission, and limited number of products... and oh how I coveted the Sierras . All I had to do was select a receiver and subwoofer. Long story short: DaveF had already done most of the subwoofer research for me (D15SE), and I found a refurbished Marantz SR5003 that I couldn't pass up. Of course there was lots of nasty anxiety in finally having to settle on the individual components, but I decided that in the end I would be happy with whatever decision I made.

I settled on Sierras for stereo and HTMs for center and surrounds. The Sierras were pushing my budget a little, but the holiday sales and b-stock made the decision (to push my budget) easy.

And hot mama! Everything finished arriving on Monday, so I haven't had a lot of listening time, but I christened the Sierras with Amériques by Edgar Varèse (no subwoofer) and I was blown away . I'm finally beginning to understand all the things (terms and whatnot) that I have spent the last six years reading about. Same experience with Stravinski's Petrushka. Then I popped in Saint-Saëns' Organ Symphony No. 3 ... ha ha ha... subwoofers make me smile big . The Rythmik blends very well with the Sierras. And it gets LOUD in my 2800 cubic foot room (when it's cranked).

As for movies, I watched The Iron Giant with my daughters. I definitely recommend the movie if you haven't seen it. It's one of my favorite animated films... and it has some deeeep bass. I sampled a few movies: Polar Express (the train arriving scene is crazy), Finding Nemo (of course), Matrix, LotR, Twister... I can't wait to actually watch them all the way through! I don't have any complaints about the HTM as a center so far... everything is so clear that I'm having trouble comprehending it!

I guess the most telling thing about the quality of the speakers is that my daughters didn't complain about listening at a slightly higher volume... they were completely engrossed with Iron Giant. Usually they start getting bored midway through a movie.

Also, my parents are in town. For them I demoed the Darla scene from Finding Nemo at almost reference levels (or whatever Audyssey set as reference). It was waaay too loud, but it sounded goooood! My dad had a huge grin on his face... and my mom even commented that it sounded good (even though she had her ears plugged).

OK. I'll stop typing now. I love the speakers. Now I need to listen (and start fine-tuning the system).