To the enthusiast 2 channel will never die
Multi channel processor ht receivers don't have the realism
Ideally dedicated 2 ch and ht rooms
If I had to pick one over the other, I'd go with 2 ch and forgo the extra speakers for surround (many movies still have a 2 channel soundtrack)
I mean no offense but this is what segment of the market is dying basically.
Allow me to share a story with you that might hit close to home Audiotom.....
Alterman audio located right around the corner from both of us just went out of business not long ago. They went out of business due to an antiquated way of thinking about audio. Audio Resource had the same thing happen not long ago. Wilson audio still exists but I'm not sure how and they are losing money hand over fist.
The reason that is is because the owners/employees of those places do not understand how the delivery of not just music but sound has changed and how it will continue to change.
I'm in the younger crowd, I'm 32, and my first major audio purchase was relatively crappy Paradigm Monitor series speakers, an Apple TV to stream MP3's from, and a projector and HUGE screen in a dedicated room.
The speakers were not great but they were good enough to make me realize MP3's sounded like crap which no other speakers had been good enough to really shine a light on for me.
By the time I sold that house and lost my dedicated room I had Martin Logans, Parasound Halo Amps, and room treatments as far as the eye can see.
But I still had my awesome projector and screen but what changed was that I was listening to lossless audio or watching hi rez Blu-Ray recordings and being thrilled by what I was seeing and hearing.
Jim is right I spent less and less time watching "movies" and more and more time listening to music but there were a lot of times that I didn't just listen to music because I wanted to watch a very well recorded concert.
You cannot tell me that Adele live at Royal Albert Hall or Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds live at Radio City is horribly recorded and sounds poor on my Integra 40.2 receiver, with HT3's, and Emotiva amplification....... It sounds freakin' amazing.
The vast majority of the younger folks getting into this hobby will NEVER own any vinyl. We got addicted to easily accessed highly portable music, realized we wanted it to sound better, and now we can have our cake and eat it too.
The reason all of the high end boutique shops with 100% analog equipment, nothing but vinyl, etc are going out of business is not because 2 channel is dead it is because when I walk in the door and tell them my equipment list and what I'm shopping for they tell me
I'M STUPID BECAUSE I DON'T OWN a 2 CHANNEL ONLY SETUP AND ONLY LISTEN TO VINYL.That is EXACTLY what happened the last time I went in both Wilson Audio and Alterman Audio which is EXACTLY why the former is dying and the latter is dead.
Is it coincidence that New Orleans Audio Video sells Sonos products and they are blowing product off the shelves?