Well after extensive research using epinions.com, ecoustics.com and personal feedback from folks here and at some other BBS I took the plunge and bought my first surround sound system.
While I was all set to go with a Home Theatre in a Box -- and I had narrowed it down to a Sony or Denon system with separate DVD players and receivers -- in the end I opted to go with a Yamaha receiver and a home theatre speaker package from JBL (actually pretty similar to what Dave1976 did I believe.)
Here is the receiver:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1107956964113
And here is the speaker package:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1114638817446
In the end I figured it out and it seemed as though the Yamaha receiver would give me a lot more inputs and outputs for future upgrades. In addition, the separate amps for each speaker seemed like a good idea.
I'm not totally sold on the speaker package that I listened to in the store, but I had a certain budget and they seemed to offer the best sound for the value without breaking the bank. I would have loved to get a bunch of Bose speakers, but then I would have been approaching a $1,000 system and somehow I don't think my wife would have approved of such an outlay. Maybe in the future I can slowly upgrade the speakers if I really don't get any satisfaction from the JBL speakers.
So I guess I know what I'll be doing in the next few days -- taking down the old system, moving the heavy cabinets, drilling holes in the living room floor and running wires underneath the crawl space . . . sounds like fun, huh?
Thanks for everyone's input.