Moved from 2 channel to Home Theatre - Regrets?

Not if you do this correctly.

You cannot achieve the same overall quality by having more of lesser quality equipment. Pick your 2-channel performance (and cost) level, and then find the money to do it 5 times instead of two. Skimping on center and rear channels, and downgrading the fronts, is why many audiophiles don't like multichannel.

Yeah, I sold my stereo and tried to live the upscale HT for a while. I tried a couple high end processors and multi-channel amps (Proceed, Classe, Anthem, etc). I found myself not listening to music like I used to, I missed it. I sold all the HT gear and went back to two channel. I keep a Denon receiver for HT duties, and just use the HT processor loop in my stereo preamp to use my main speakers as front channels in HT. The Denon only drives the rear channels, phantom center.
I'm much happier now, I listen to music more, and I find I don't miss the high end HT since I'm visually distracted while watching movies anyway.

Cheers,
John

I used to have HT... Theta Casablanca feeding three big ARC stereo amps, speakers all over the place.

I recently decided that it wasn't lending a lot of enjoyment to my experience. Half the time, even watching movies, I never bothered to even turn on the amp controlling the rear speakers. Hell, half the time I'm watching a movie, I'm stretched out on the couch anyway. At the same time, all that HT stuff was taking up too much space in my limited area...

So, I ditched the Casablanca, the amp for the rears, a gazillion wires, a pair of speakers and stands, and bought dCS PCM rig and an ARC LS-16. Much happier now. All it does is redbook CD, but it does it well. Zero regrets.

Obviously, calculus is a lot different if hearing stuff whiz by to the back gets your motor running...

I'm an old-time 2 channel guy.

Back around '98 I fell into the HT trap. 2 subs, Lexicon, Martin Logans all over the place. Big amps, lots of wire.
Mega Complexity.

2 channel sucked on the thing.

All gone now. I run my DVD player through the 2 channel system. My speakers image well, no need for a center channel, no need for sub(s). No need for a pile of wires all over the place.

I'm a happy guy now.

Best,

Paul :-)