That said, I'm kind of worried about the asymmetry on the corners. By nature corners affect bass notes, but the left corner looks like it could have some diffusion effect. What I'd do is DIY some acoustic panels (just Google that, a lot of tutorials come up, and over here I get the stuff from Home Depot; the filler we usually get from another store that deals with industrial textiles) to go over the shapes on that corner, then DIY generally the same panels for the right but make sure that you can have them free-standing and mimic the shape on the left.
What I'm not sure of is how you could get space to do the DIY; if you haven't moved in your stuff and you have no neighbors who need to sleep on weekend mornings, I'd do it in there and capitalize on the space and not having any stuff to get sawdust all over. Maybe try to work it out with the manager as part of your moving in process?
Well, here's the thing about the estimated budget - make sure it doesn't blow a hole through your financials. I assume you'd still deal with student loans or something, so at the very least, blow only expendable cash, and use only credit cards that have those low or zero interest deals on monthly payments that won't have you eating instant noodles. At the very least pizza shouldn't become a luxury, and you can still get a steak to eat at home once in a while.
With that out of the way, $2,500
can go a long way if we go for deals online.
AFAIK, the Airport Express will only do 320kbps - the speaker set-up will be a lot of work just to listen to that. I'd get around that and the BR player by using a music server. I assume you have Apple gear since you posted the AirPort Express - what I'd do is get a (used) MacMini and configure it to run as a Headless Audio Server (just Google it, lots of tutorials - although be specific as most of them are for Android) and you can use a tablet or smartphone as an interface so no need to install a monitor out there. You can either use an HDD inside the MacMini, or hook up an external HDD; from there you can feed a DAC using USB or Optical. Just make sure the Mini you're getting has the Optical port, and functional, if you're getting an older used unit.
Alternately there are tutorials on how to run a $100 Android MiniPC as a headless server. Also...is the TT that important? Because I was thinking you could probably just use small direct digital amps, and the whole concept does away with analog inputs. The nice thing about these is that they can do away with the bulk of traditional amps, and already have a DAC built in as well.
-----------
In any case, I found the NAD D3020 direct digital amplifier and Focal Chorus 806V on MusicDirect for a total of $1100. The D3020 has 30wpc vs, say, 100wpc vs the NuForce DDA-100, but I doubt you'd need all that much (I've heard the D3020 at a hi-fi show fill a moderately sized room with full sound out of small PSB speakers, it should do better on the 806V), and it has an analog input so there's a way to use the TT if you really insist on using one. It also has a subwoofer preamp output, so you can easily spend $600 on if you would rather have a sub fill in the lows, especially to have the bass very audible (ie get that "kick" from the bass) before you get the speakers playing too loud and annoy the neighbors. All that should be around $2,000, plus taxes and shipping. Buy the speaker cables terminated from BlueJeans cable, plus whatever analog or SPDIF interconnect you need that they might have one of (not sure about optical, but easy enough to find one). In any case, you still should have a little bit for the MacMini, and you should hold off on the sub anyway until you feel like you need it. Note though that while it may save you from setting the amp on the mains too loud, the bass notes can be more audible outside your own apartment, so while it might not be noisy in terms of absolute db your neighbors might still get to heat the thumping. Or feel it. In any case, save that for last.
http://www.musicdirect.com/p-139677-focal-chorus-806v-bookshelf-speakers-pr.aspx
http://www.musicdirect.com/p-155651-nad-d-3020-hybrid-digital-integrated-amp.aspx
Thank you so much for your reply.
So based on your recommendation, are you suggesting I not purchase the MMGs?