stuck in a quandry -what's best solely on quality?

I'd keep the Stratos powering the front 2 channels, buy a relatively inexpensive Denon receiver(or similar) with preamp outs to handle processing and power for center/surrounds, and put your money into a high-quality stereo preamp for critical 2-channel listening. Hook the front L/R preamp out from the receiver to any line-level input on the stereo preamp(or the tape loop) and you're good to go(you'll have to volume match the stereo pre for surround/movies unless it has a home theater pass-through option). This way you maximize critical 2-channel sound quality(I'm assuming since you bought the Odyssey you care more about stereo performance) and minimize the expense on the other areas that may be less critical to you and that you may need/want to change again as surround formats continue to evolve(as opposed to blowing big $$$ on a pre/pro that probably won't sound as good as a quality stereo preamp and may or may not be truly upgradable for future formats). Best of luck.

Tim

You pretty much hit the nail on the head. A lot of stereo preamps these days have a "video" input that you can use for this purpose, but any line-level input will work and you're right that the preamp will need at least two inputs(or one input and a tape loop) for this to work. And yes, the stereo preamp will be the only thing running into the Stratos(the whole point of this is to have only high-quality stereo components handling the signal for 2-channel listening)

The only limitation with this(if the preamp doesn't have an HT pass-through feature) is that when you set the volume levels for all the speakers with the A/V receiver you'll need to have one reference point on the stereo preamp(say halfway) so when you switch to surround everything remains in balance. Some stereo preamps(see below) feature an HT pass-through(generally assigned to one of the line-level inputs) which essentially takes the stereo preamp's volume control out of the circuit allowing the A/V receiver or pre/pro total control over the volume(i.e. no need to set a reference level on the stereo preamp--it just passes the signal through from the receiver to the amp, hence the name HT pass-through). If you have a wife/kids/roommates that also use your system the HT pass-through is nice to have, otherwise it's just a convenience thing(although you'll have lots more choices if you don't need the HT pass-through feature).

Some manufacturers that offer an HT pass-through: ARC, BAT, Sonic Frontiers, Rogue, Conrad-Johnson, VAC, McCormack(RLD-1), Proceed/Levinson, Adcom(GFP-750), and a few others I can't think of right now.

With this type of setup you're likely to save some money, get better stereo sound, have better upgrade flexibility, and have less $$$ at risk as surround formats evolve. If you care mostly about 2-channel and don't necessarily need state-of-the-art home theater performance I think this is an optimal setup. Best of luck.

Tim