Hey Tom's,
I just bought a Toshiba 40" 1080 with a DTS (digital output) and am trying to upgrade somewhat but someone once told me it is a lot easier to spend to little money than too much. Anyway, 2.1 is attractive for a bunch of reasons but I read that that was not surround sound and with only two speakers was really for listening to music. So I started looking at the 5.1 don't really need the woofer if there is one built in but what I am most interested in the having the "center speakers" as my wife and i have trouble with speech/dialog etc and have read that that goes through the center speakers and you can increase the volume there and have better speach recognition. So, anyway, i see that you are only recommending the 2.1 systems here and so it looks like you don't agree with the need for 5.1