GreenMan72

Hi all,

I'm not at all an audio authority, but my wife and I have been thinking about enhancing our TV experience and possibly going for a surround sound system.

Lately been noticing these sound bars more and more which could be a cheaper option.

Are they any good? Or should we stick with a surround system.

Not after anything too fancy or complex and can probably spend in the vicinity of $500-$1,000.

Any thoughts, comments or recommendations would be appreciated (and good locations to buy from).

Russ_Sarah

i am looking at the sony htct-660 which is supposed to be very good, and a bargin at the moment at harvey norman for $350.

TheCreature

Will a sound bar be as good as a surround system,? Almost certainly not.
Would a sound bar do a more than adequate job, be easier to set-up and be more atheistically pleasing. Probably yes.
If you're not 'in to' Hi-Fi then a sound bar will do a perfectly acceptable job, especially if its going to be used primarily with the TV.
Yamaha invented them and are probably still the best at it, especially if you include bang for you buck in the equation.
Something like a YAS-152 might be enough for your needs, or the YSP-1400 if you want to spend a bit more.

stuckinblighty

Ive bought a sony 5.2 amp with a pair of decent floorstanding speakers.Does the job a treat...tv sounds great (find it impossible to listen to the poxy tv speakers now) music channels and dvd/cd/ bluray sound incredible :-D

Mike at Taree

Bought a Yamaha YAS-100 from Bing Lee, it's supposed to be entry level but does a brilliant job. I hate surround sound systems that involve laying spaghetti all round the lounge room. The Aldi $99 sound bars with a separate sub woofer are also fairly good for a spare TV and miles ahead of the crappy speakers in modern thin TVs.

BTW the syringe is the anti-crow water pistol

Also if you want to enhance your viewing experience and have WIFI get a smart TV dongle, thousands of free shows and movies out there.

GarryP

Personally I'd say stick with a real 5.1 system, and decent amp.

Provided you have the amp near the screen (the usual for people) it's only the rear satellites where you need to either lay wires, or go for a wireless speaker solution.

Real speakers, particularly a proper 5.1 system with speakers behind you and a decent sub will push the quality significantly over anything a soundbar can manage.

Oh, and not all soundbars are equal. Some are complex audio engineering designed to use time of flight, narrow audio beams and other tricks to give you a wide sound stage. And some are 3 or 4 slightly better than TV quality speakers pumping the high frequencies out in every direction.

GreenMan72

Quick update - appreciating all the feedback here - very informative.

I might pop into an audio store (or the audio department at Myers or DJ) and ask for some demos. Valuable advice there guys

My wife just had our first child 5 weeks ago so we've been lying low at home (and I had a couple of week's paternity leave). So we've both been watching a lot of DVD box sets, in between all the feeding, caressing, drives in car to calm him down etc. Been realising how cr*p our defaulty TV speakers are!

GarryP

The two things, beside generally better quality, that people notice are a real seat shaking bass, and sound coming from all around you in those key scenes. Unfortunately the first of those is the one that really requires size to shift large volumes of air - a soundbar on its own can only do so much (so the best ones seem to be paired with subs).

The problem is Oz is not blessed with great audio options. The small selection of choices is generally massively overpriced with only real muppets selling them. Hell, I think everything I have came from the UK - it ended up being the more sensible option, even with the size. If this were the UK I'd send you down to Richer Sounds for a cheap bundle in one of their many sales - here the same thing would cost 3 times as much, if you could get it at all.

Don't neglect the amp either, if you want to benefit from True HD audio on Blu Rays, you need something that can deal with it.

EvannTel

Two thoughts rom me (who has spent some silly money in the pasts on this hobby):

1) Do not go to Myer or JB HiFi. Go to a proper HiFi shop. They do not cost more and will offer infinitely better service.

2) Im no expert on sound bars but I believe you need to some reasonable reflective walls to bounce the sound to get the 3D effect so if you are open plan is may not work.

GarryP

OP maybe interested in these deals, on at the moment:

http://www.videopro.com.au/p-6773-pi...re-system.aspx

http://www.harveynorman.com.au/tv-ho...re-system.html

you can certainly do better than these if you spend more cash, but they are pretty good for the target market. Easily available in Oz and you ought to be able to talk them down in price.

Of the two I'd tend towards the Yamaha system, it maybe a lowly spec amp (basically a RX-V375), but still good and if you find you want to upgrade the front speakers later, it's possible. I might also see if I could source the Yamaha YHT-399 rather than YHT-299 as above, in Oz. That one comes with network connection which enables playback of audio from a NAS, or Internet Radio. Bing Lee do it, but getting a sensible price is the problem.

Tr1boy

I'm not looking at any of this right but will when we're back in Oz, but I haven't seen anyone mention Sonos, no good?

It's funny really because as a musician (I use that term loosely!) I've always been more interested in playing than listening. I have two low output Class A amps that are biased to within a mghz of their life. I used to record from mic placements but nowadays I'm just a home noodler so do a lot of stuff via a BE10.

Stereo wise I've never been that fussed as I simply don't spend a lot of time listening to what already has been written and time is better spent writing stuff of my own, but I did have a little PianoCraft unit that was ok (still have the speakers) but it was a clunky set up compared to today's offerings.

Soundbars seem to be the best solution for someone like me. Having said that I am about to buy a HDMX Jam Plus because they're just so cheap (and cute looking).

TheCreature

Probably very true. There's a touch of snobbery surrounding hi-fi, with 'fans' looking down on less esoteric kit... but if you don't need it, why buy it?
If all you want is something that bit better than the average TV will put out, then a sound bar is fine.

GarryP

As I said, the usual wow factor of better than TV speakers are the deep bass for the explosions, and the sound coming from all around you. No soundbar on its own is going to really cut it for those.

And in any case, $379 for 5 speakers, an active sub, and a separate AV amp isn't exactly HiFi snob territory.

raywinston

I would recommend a surround system rather than a sound bar as this is what i have been using for the last few year. A few friends have sound bars i don't think they have the same effect.