what's your AV system? mine is rather dated, and could you an upgrade, but with constant changes, I'm reductant
I'm running a 2011 Panasonic plasma, ~2009ish higher end Onkyo receiver, Paradigm Atom surrounds with a timbre matched Paradigm center channel and a Paradigm 12" sub. Its all been pieced together over time and none of it is over the top, but it works great and sounds awesome in my space. All of the speakers are ~20 years old now, I got them second hand in excellent condition. I also grabbed the Onkyo receiver recently to replace an old Denon receiver I was using.
You can never stay ahead of the changes, but there are few standard changes that you can't workaround. The only one on the horizon that would be of any concern is UHD/4K, but that's still being figured out and is at a minimum a few years a way from seeing any type of reasonable adoption. Dolby Atmos might be another one but I haven't been paying to much attention to it.
You can run the same 5.1 speakers that were available in the mid 90's. Some of the surround codecs have changed, but that's handled by the receiver. Moving to 7.1 interests me but the reality is there aren't a ton of movies out there that utilize it. I was able to move from standard def to HD using my older non-HDMI receiver by running the video over HDMI directly into my display and sending the audio signals via Coax or optical into the receiver. You're then switching signals at two different points (TV and Receiver) but a good, programmable universal remote that will do this for you with one button is the best piece of gear you can buy. You would be able to do the same in the future if you ended up with a reciever that couldn't hand 4k video pass through. Point is, there are ways to work around/adapt to new tech as it comes out, you don't have to do a wholesale change over.
The initial iterations of Plasma's really doomed them and gave consumers bad perceptions. They weighed a ton, had loud cooling fans, and had IR and burn in issues. Pioneer got them right around 2009 and Panasonic perfected them with their 2012 line-up. Then they were killed off.
So in other updates, I need to put the kitchen sink back in tonight, it really sucks not having a sink. The new countertops are 5-15 days out, the exact install date isn't scheduled yet. Our place is a mess though with all of our kitchen stuff piled in the dining room. I know home improvements are never fun, but I think they are even less so when you are in a smaller space like a condo.
I had to run to New Brunfus after work yesterday to swing by the courthouse and sign some paperwork. In one of the new hats I'm wearing, I'm taking on co-guardianship of my younger sister who has Cerebral Palsy as the first step in longer term transition plan for her care. Since we were in the old 'hood we checked out some of the campus (lots of changes and construction) and had a nice dinner downtown. Busy rest of the week and weekend lined up.
