As mentioned in my welcome board post, I am attempting to build a multi-headed, dancing, disappearing (aka pondless) fountain. I have next to no experience with landscaping, pond design, or most of the related activities, but I am an enthusiastic researcher... So for the first part of my design (or at least I assume this should be the first part), I want to try and lock down the basin design. Due to the desire to have 9 fountains, I am looking at a 10' x 10' basin (with possible shallow extension).

From the research I have done so far, it looks like I have several options for basin design.

Option 0: Preformed basin only.
Rejected due to small size of preformed basins.

Option 1: Preformed primary basin with extension via pond liner
In this scenario, I would use a preformed (4' x 4') basin in the center of the basin that would be attached to a pond liner extending the basin out to the 10' design. Upside to this approach is the ability to have a preformed center unit with a deeper location in order to support a primary pump. Downside is that (per feedback from a friend), this approach would seem very likely to require multiple leak tests and probable problems in the "gluing" of the liner to the preformed unit.

Option 2: Pond liner w/ Aquablox fill
In researching water collection systems, I ran across a system by Aquascape called Aquablox. For intents and purposes, they seem to be high-tech plastic milk crate designed to create the form for the basin while having a high strength and low volume. Using the Aquablox system, I will also not need the plastic grate under the surface rocks as the blocks themselves fulfill that need. The downside that I see to this system looks like it will be harder to route the various pipes to the water features.

Option 3: Pond line w/ plastic grating and cinder blocks.
With this option, I again use a standard liner but instead of the AquaBlox, I use strategically positioned cinder blocks to support both the plastic mesh grating and water features. Upsides to this approach appear to be a lower cost, but I need to be more concerned with placement of blocks to properly support all the weight of the various grates and water features.

So here are my questions:
1) Are there other approaches I am missing?
2) Which approach is recommended and why?
3) What effect does the need to add the plumbing options have on the approaches?

Thanks,