Looking for a Home theatre in 25K with video upscaling

Hi,

I am looking for setting up a Home Theatre with my 32-inch LCD that supports 1080.

- The room size is small 11x13.
- Looking for a 5.1
- Video upscale to 1080 for Taka Sky signal
- convert steroe to 5.1
- budget is ~25K.

Thanks
-Pratik

This is difficult at the price range you are looking at. What you need is an AVR that accepts component input and has HDMI with an upscaler built in. Such AVRs will cost around 40,000 (such as Denon 1909 or Yamaha 863)

A decent AVR will play stereo only through the Front L&R channels. In other words, it will play it in stereo mode only. Though there may be ways of playing a stereo through all channels of a 5.1, you will destroy the beauty of the music, and just add noise. Remember a stereo has data only for two channels. You cannot create additional data for 5.1 channels.

At this budget it will be nearly impossible to assemble a HT system that will upscale to 1080p. What you can look for are entry level AVRS from Denon, Onkyo, Yamaha, or Marantz. You can also look at sub/sat speakers consisting of a sub woofer with 5 small cubes speakers. These itself will cost around 20,000.

You have two options:

1. Look at a second hand HT system withing your budget. I doubt you will get an upscaling HT system even second hand at that price.
2. Buy what is called Home Theater in a Box (HTIB) from companies such as Samsung, LG, Onkyo, Philips, etc. These will cost around roughly 30,000. Then add a upscaling DVD player from companies such as Samsung, Philips, Pioneer. This will cost you another 7 to 8 thousand Rupees. So you have to look for a budget of around 40,000 to 45,000 at the least.

Cheers