Help with selecting best receiver and in-wall speakers

[gdaymate]

I'm building some tourist cottages, and need help to select the best a/v system for them. We have a central location where a server could be located, which is about 30m from the furthest cottage, and we have 25mm conduit laid from here to each cottage, so we can hardwire for Gigabit with Cat6 as many services as possible (and thus minimise the need to go wireless). Movies will be ripped to the server's hard disk. As the lounge room is not very large we only require a 2.1 system here so will use 2 in-wall speakers and a subwoofer. We'd also like music in the bedroom, so this could be provided via an A-B switch (with a volume control) mounted on the wall next to the bed connected to 2 bedroom in-ceiling speakers. Or, a simpler setup might be, to just have a volume control on the bedroom wall switch, and to leave all 4 speakers on the whole time, and just turn the volume down on the bedroom wall switch at night. There isn't line of sight from the bedroom to the receiver, so a separate remote wouldn't work unless I used an IR extender kit (which might be more flexible, and a similar price to hardwiring a wall-switch).


We need a receiver for each cottage that will:
-Be able to play BluRay from a PS3 to a Full HD TV via HDMI in the lounge
-Take PayTv (Austar) which require a S-Video connection
-be linked to either a networked Apple TV or Netgear EVA2000, which will provide the user interface
-be able to be kept in a locked cupboard and operated via remote only.
-be under $1200
-be able to do HDMI switching, so it makes using it very simple for the user
-iPod connection

The most common receivers capable of this seem to be:
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Sony STRDG710B (HDMI switcher only, no video converting, -so can't handle BluRay?)
Sony STRDG910B (HDMI repeater, states it's 'ideal for BluRay')
Yamaha RXV861B (this claims to offer Soundzone 2+3 with separate remote, whatever this means).
Onkyo TXSR605S


Speaker suggestions (budget about $400-450/pair)
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Lounge is for music and movies, bedroom is just for music. There's a lot of glass in the lounge (2 walls of it), and one glass wall in the bedroom. Both rooms are smallish, 30-40 sqm, with 3m high ceilings.

Jensen EHT-8 ($319/pair)
Paradigm AMS-100R ($550/pair)
Sonance Symphony S622TR ($499/pair) Recommeded by Smarthouse magazine
B&W ?

Subwoofer
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No idea. Depends on Receiver/speakers.


Question: If I only have a 2.1 setupo, do Dolby True HD/DTS-HD and the other HD sound formats matter?


I welcome any suggestions/improvements to this plan.