Thank you for the correction Jack. I see that Onkyo and NAD share at least one common component.

 
To be honest I have not looked in the direction of Onkyo in two years due to bad experiences. I know I will piss some happy Onkyo owners off here by speaking my mind about them so I will apologize in advance. Onkyo is a brand that I associate with a box store. High volume, high margin, high failure rate. I had the opportunity to be a dealer for Onkyo a couple of years ago. I tried them out on one project and only one. First component was dead out of the box. By the time the replacement had arrived one of the ports on the CD changer was no longer providing output. By the time that was replaced I lost the tuner on the receiver. My father had an Onkyo for eight years before needed to replace it for it lost its ability to decode a digital feed. I switched him to Denon as NAD was just out of his price range. I know it could have been a bad production run or bad batch, a lot of companies get that at one point or another but that type of thing really leaves a bad taste in ones mouth. I try not to bash any companies here but right down to the extremely generous profit margin Onkyo just came across as cheaply made. Only Monster Cable offered a margin that large (wire products only). This was two years ago so things may have changed some since then.

Ok with that off my chest let me use an analogy for you Dana. Having been through the CCNA from Cisco, web design and A+ I hope you can relate to this. We are all after a kick but performance for our dollar. Everyone. Maximum performance for minimal investment was my companies motto. If you had to buy a prebuilt kick butt computer and needed the most performance for the money would you go to a box store and take the large box in the middle of the isle with monitor included? EMachines or another competing brand? Probably not. Alienware or Acer or SystemMax aka Tiger Direct or something along those lines is what I am guessing you would lean towards. Possibly even Dell at the right time of the year. Each of the names I mentioned except Emachines are not easily found. You have to look for them. The Emachines will boast similar numbers, at least for those who are not savvy on computer terminology or building one for themselves. The Emachines may even offer more features from memory card readers to included software. Why is it less then? Back to the original question of how do you want to use it and what features do you need to accomplish this? Emachines can do this by downgrading the quality of the components on the inside in order to pack in more features. Just as most electronics manufacturers do.

From memory you want great two channel and great multi channel performance. Vinyl is something you plan to play on your system and video performance is important. Especially standard definition content on an HD display. By your posts I am guessing that you have critical tastes. Again I am sure you will enjoy your home theater in whichever direction you choose to invest your money in. If it were a system I had to spec I would go with a receiver renowned for musicality, quality and durability. Your room is not all that large either. Many seasoned industry professionals have stated that the only receiver that sounds better than an NAD is an Arcam. Arcam starts their line at twenty four hundred dollars. What functions do you need out of a receiver?

Money can be saved in other area's if it needs be. Especially that rack you mentioned. Most racks cost a grand that I have seen. By the time shelves and trim pieces are in place it adds up.  I have a couple tricks that I could share on how to get a rack mounted system and not spend all that much on the rack itself. Get only the rails and mount them to sturdy wooden framing. from there add your shelves and trim. As long as you can get behind the rack they are easy to do. With no rear access wiring gets hard in a hurry. Middle Atlantic makesd a rack that pivots once it is pulled out of its enclosure. $$$$ Give that cool cube from active thermals website a second look. It will easily ventilate a closet and is less than half of a rack system dollar wise. 

Get a great receiver. Its an investment. You wont regret getting a solid platform there. Marantz, NAD, Pioneer Elite, ect.. Since we are here on this site speakers don't need to be covered. Consider the DVDO and or a Key Digital video processor. DVDO has sales once a year. Check out www.ramelectronics.net I found one there 30 percent off once. HDMI has been known to produce the poor edge detail you read about or made mention to in a previous post. Especially with one or two things present. Standard definition analog program converted to digital and shown on a HD resolution. HDMI 1.2 specification was only 4Gb/s. HDMI 1.3 is 10Gb/s. With wireless networking we know those kinds of numbers are not working numbers, only reference. With a really good quality display I never was able to get a good image from HDMI 1.2. If you need HDMI for BluRay or HDDVD then so be it but dont use the HDMI port on your television feed. Not until they update the cable or satellite decoder boxes to be 1.3 spec. Do you need HD scaling? Does the receiver need HDMI switching? A good quality coax wire in component video usage will often produce a better image than HDMI. Find someone who makes their own cables and ask them what they would charge to wire your whole system with interconnects. I will bet it will be less than Monster Cable. 

Just a few thoughts.  Getting off my soapbox now. Happy auditioning.

Daryl 

To answer a question you aked that I never answered. No NAD components are usually the same size as other receivers. They do offer a few units that integrate a cd/dvd player in to the chassis. The newest of them along with the Masters Series take on a different look.