Where the Heck are the Small A/V Receivers?

In the family room is an existing feature-wall-built-in that is wired for 7 channel (channels 6 and 7 being for front height) sound. The built-in includes an electric fireplace, a spot for a flatscreen TV above, which can be shuttered with some clunky doors. On either side of the fireplace are low-doored cabinets with three shelves above. It’s a beautiful unit and is altogether pretty awesome until the home theater geek in me took a closer look.

There were a few catches and some potentially massive problems with the built-in:

• The depth. The center column is only 15″ deep. The depth of the cabinets and shelves is only 10″ deep.
• The speaker wires are thin gauge and were put in first before the built-in was finished around them. Making switching them out not possible for this “unhandy” man.

The shallow depth meant that my Marantz SR6009 receiver, while already one of the shallower depth A/V receivers on the market, is too deep. And that I had to start looking at speaker alternatives as the bookshelf options I have are all too deep. The latter point is less of a problem than the former.

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