New and confused

I hope you don't mind, but I've joined the site because I'm looking for some helpful feedback about what equipment to buy and where to buy it from. I'm from Sydney, and my partner and I are looking to buy and set up home theatre and music equipment in our new home. I've been looking on ebay, and at sites in Australia and the USA, for amplifiers, in-ceiling speakers and outdoor speakers, and we've been looking at Sonos vs Logitech Squeezebox for our music system. Please excuse me if the sound system questions aren't appropriate here - I'm just completely confused and not sure who to ask. Any help anyone can give me would be fantastic.
Thanks
Jacqui

[John Simpson]

Hi Jacqui,

I'm from Hobart and am one of the moderators on the forum. Feel free to post any and all of your questions -- in the end it's everyone who benefits as the answers are public domain.

Remember, there are no stupid questions! (But as we do this for free, I can't promise you there won't be stupid answers )

Cheers!
John

Thanks John.

Is this the area where I should list any details about equipment that I've already been looking at, or am I meant to go to a different forum area? As you can see, I'm a complete novice at this forum thing too.

Cheers
Jacqui

[Mike P.]

Hi Jacqui and welcome to the Shack! A good place to post about what equipment to buy and where to buy it from would be "Home Theater Systems" forum.

http://www.hometheatershack.com/foru...eater-systems/

[mechman]

Welcome to the Shack Jacqui!

mech

[Sonnie]

Hello Jacqui and welcome to the Shack!

Hopefully we can help you out...

[nova]

Hello Jacqui, Welcome to the Shack. Don't worry about being a novice at Home Theater, or the Forums. We're a very tolerant bunch and would be very happy to help steer you in the right direction.

[Spridle]

I just installed a Sonos and run the optical-out so I can use the DACs in my processor. The services steam at 128kbps WMA which is near CD quality. I have A/Bed with CDs and it's hard to tell a difference. I noticed a big quality difference over the music stations I was getting though my cable provider. The handheld remote is very handy. I listen to Rhapsody and Pandora the most. With Pandora, you can create your own stations based on songs or artists you like. Rhapsody streams endless streams of songs on its stations with no voice-overs. You can skip songs too (I don't know how they do this). I just like to listen to a variety of music in my house and Sonos is a great solution for this. Squeezebox Duet is similar and the remote looks cooler, but not sure what music services they will be offering.