Home cinema in a box: Budget £500

I'm looking for a 'reasonably-priced' surround-sounds system to go with my PF9986, I'm thinking 'home cinema in a box'

Home Cinema Choice just did a test and recommends the Philips LX7500, which I can pick up for a bit less than £500 online, it includes a DVD recorder which is good. Has anyone got this and can comment?

Or what else would you recommend around this budget?

Car man

 

just go for seperates, u can get a reasonable dvd player, amp and speakers for #500- if you look around good enough.

 

pioneer 575 : £100
denon 1705 : £200
Tannoy Fx5.1 : £200

thats £500 for a seperates system and imo will out do all All in one's you compare it against

i wrote this in another thread. yes you will need interconnects but this will beat a home cinema in a box 10x over

 

Plus no Philips!

 

Or if you want an all in one, being that you posted in the all in one forum, buy the Denon 500 which leaves you £100 to blow on what ever you like.

 

Thanks for all the ideas!

Home Cinema Choice did say this Philips system was better than their 'old' favourite, the Denon, and I assume it's built to go with the Philips LCD TVs (though I'm probably wrong about that...)

Sounds like separates are the popular choice, though. Also, in their favour, if I want to plug in my Humax Freeview/HD (which I may) then am I right in thinking the all-in-one system won't be able to accommodate an extra input, whereas a stand-alone receiver will (anyone?)

Car man

 

It depends on what home cinema system you buy and whether it channels pictures through it. The Denon has composite inputs, thereby products that have phono outputs can be connected here, there is also an optical input and a coaxial input. The standalone amps tend to have more inputs which you can use to feed through your other pieces of equipment.