Is anyone using this for rear surrounds?

I've been running a 3.1 system for nearly 2 years now as a compromise with my fiance. While she is willing to deal with my obsession until we get a dedicated media room, she doesn't want to deal with wires running through the living room. I've also been planning on upgrading from my 1050, but I haven't spent the money yet since I won't be able to enjoy true surround sound anyway.

Would the OAW3 and a 2 channel amp be a solution for my rear surrounds? I don't think I'm willing to spend $700 on two 2200's, but there has to be a decent 2 channel amp out there that would work for this application. Once I have a media room and can run the wires, I would use the OAW3 for my subwoofer. Or should I just stop being lazy and run the many feet of wire around the wall? Thoughts?

The OAW3 will work fine for you application.

I was going to use the Behringer A500 amps (~$200 for 2-channel) before I chose the Outlaw 7075. The outlaw combo deal was just too good to pass up. Finding a decent two-channel amp for not too much $ should be pretty easy.

I agree with EEman. The OAW3 and a stereo amp would work fine. Lots of good amps on Audiogon, plus some little stereo amps floating around that could work well enough for surrounds. You'll still need a place in the rear of the room for the amp and its wires to live, but that avoids the need to get wires from the receiver.

You could get two self powered speakers and feed them signal from the OWA3. Likely to cost more $$$ than Gonks plan though. Another possible path to go down is to use some computer speakers with a sub and two satellites. You just plug it into the OWA3 and voila instant sound. You can usually find a set that has a bass volume control so you can turn the bass down and leave the satellites as your surrounds. Cheap and it might do in a pinch until you can get it all set up the way you want. Who knows, maybe the fiance likes it well enough to let you go whole hog.

I'm assuming from the sig that there are a pair of Outlaw Bookshelves sitting unused. A nice little amp of some sort would be worth tracking down in that case...

Thanks for the advice everyone. That Behringer has gotten good reviews, and it is about the price I want to spend. And yes, I do have a pair of Outlaw Bookshelf speakers collecting dust!

I was looking at the manual for the OAW3, and it only shows a hookup for a subwoofer. Mono of course. Would the setup for rear surrounds be: stereo RCA to 1/8" wire -> transmitter unit -> receiver unit -> 1/8" to stereo RCA wire-> amp -> speakers?

Yes, that's how you'd do it. The OAW3 docs say that it comes with only one stereo 1/8" to stereo RCA adapter, in which case you'd need to buy another one. I'm having trouble remembering if mine actually came with two of the stereo adapters. I thought they did but I'll have to check as I suffer from mild CRS.

Don't forget ebay. I have seen some nice Parasound amps sell for under $300 with the older high wpc amps like the HCA 1200 going for near the top of that range and lower wpc amps like the 750 (75wpc) going for under $150.