johnnybt:

A little more info on the "house-wide speaker system" would probably help those who would offer suggestions. You don't say whether it's an existing distribution system (central control, volume pots, keypads?) or just speakers in rooms with wiring run to them.

It would also help to know about the "TV room speakers". This ties in with the pending receiver purchase. I can't imagine anyone purchasing a receiver for an A/V viewing area that was not a surround receiver.

Two of your goals were:
"cheap rather than expensive"
"run it all through the one receiver"

Some HT receivers in Onkyo's Integra line come A-BUS ready to support 4 remote locations. Power and signal go over Cat5 to each keypad and then get amplified locally. The 4 keypad expansion kit comes with a basic function remote for the other zones, but the keypads each have an IR reciever in them and will relay IR commands to a hub with emitters to control sources. So you can buy an inexpensive learning remote and teach it all your source equipment's codes and keep it handy for roaming the remote zones.

There are other manufacturers with A-BUS solutions that would probably work just fine with this receiver. The one I heard was actually Russound but it has multiple IR/Cat5 distribution components and strays from your "one-box" spec.

This solution won't be mistaken for whole house hi-fi, but it's all in one box and provides the basic functions you outlined. The Russound system I listened to made more than tolerable background muzak.

None of this addresses your desire for RF control, and if you're not up to penetrating the sheetrock to distribute Cat5 then RF might be the solution for you.