Soundbar advice

valve90210

valve90210

valve90210

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Joined
17 Jan 2006
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Hi All

My ex's dad was asking me about sound bars the other day as he is interested in better sound than his Panasonic tv but doesn't really know what to get.

He's looking at a budget of around £300 and isn't bothered by surround sound.

He's be looking to hook up a Sky HD box and possibly his Xbox 360 and PS3.

I don't really know much about them and wondered if anyone could recommend anything that would fit the bill and sound good?

Thanks
 
valve90210 said:
Hi All

My ex's dad was asking me about sound bars the other day as he is interested in better sound than his Panasonic tv but doesn't really know what to get.

He's looking at a budget of around £300 and isn't bothered by surround sound.

He's be looking to hook up a Sky HD box and possibly his Xbox 360 and PS3.

I don't really know much about them and wondered if anyone could recommend anything that would fit the bill and sound good?

Thanks
Click to expand...
I have just purchased the Samsung HW-H600 SOUNDBASE and am very happy with it. Great sound - good price at around £170. Good for me due to space issues, Samsung 48" TV fits nicely on top and they both look good. Soundshare works well also with my TV wireless connection.
 
I completely forgot about this over the weekend!

Thanks for the suggestions, my only concern is that these seem to tend to have only one HDMI input. I'm not sure what outputs his tv has for audio or what it will pass through.

Would it be best to hook the consoles and the sky box up through a cheap HDMI switch so everything goes through the sound bar and is switched as needed?

Also, do these bars pass audio through to the TV so the tv audio can be used at times when the sound bar is not wanted?
 
I have a sound bar on my Panny plasma, it uses ARC (HDMI slot).

I have my
HDMI 1 Sky HD+ box (HMDI switcher with Droid box)
HDMI 2 Sound bar (ARC slot)
HDMI 3 PS4

I have not other cables plugged in to anything else for sound.

All the sound goes through the sound bar. So if your TV has ARC that is what you want to use. If not Im guessing optical out from the TV to the sound bar.
 
I got a Tannoy Basestation One which my TV sits on and am very pleased with it.

I connect my TV to it via the optical lead and it works fine with TV, Sky and PS4. If turned off the TV's speakers can be used. I can also stream to it via Blue Tooth.

Prices vary on-line, I did a search and got mine for £199.00!
 
valve90210 said:
Thanks for the suggestions, my only concern is that these seem to tend to have only one HDMI input. I'm not sure what outputs his tv has for audio or what it will pass through.

Would it be best to hook the consoles and the sky box up through a cheap HDMI switch so everything goes through the sound bar and is switched as needed?

Also, do these bars pass audio through to the TV so the tv audio can be used at times when the sound bar is not wanted?
Click to expand...
If he's not interested in surround sound then passing the sound through a TV which makes it stereo really won't make much difference. What happens with audio on pass-through via the TV only really affects soundbars and audio systems that need a true 5.1 signal. If the soundbar is stereo (with or without sub) then any incomming 5.1 sound will be mixed down to stereo before it's heard. Do you really think it matters if it's the TV or the speakerbar that does this?
 
Not quite sure what you're getting at there Lucid?

If you're referring to me saying I'm not sure what the TV passes through, what I meant was, I don't even know if it has an audio pass through or not which obviously affects the way the system can be setup.
 
valve90210 said:
Not quite sure what you're getting at there Lucid?

If you're referring to me saying I'm not sure what the TV passes through, what I meant was, I don't even know if it has an audio pass through or not which obviously affects the way the system can be setup.
Click to expand...

The TV does do audio pass-thru. That's the whole point of using either the TV's optical output or (if it has it and the soundbar is compatible) the HDMI ARC connection.

Sound from the TV's tuner and also sound from any external sources connected to the TV via HDMI, SCART, Component + audio, Composite + audio, and USB/memory card is all routed to both the TV speakers and the audio out connections (optical/ARC).

Since your ex's dad isn't in to AV and just wants "some better sound" then the simple approach is the best. The simplest approach is to connect all sources to the TV and allow that to act as the switch for what gets to the soundbar. If you go along that route, and the soundbar is a basic one rather than something trying to emulate surround by bouncing sound off adjacent walls, then you'll find all that I said about it being stereo is correct. :)
 
Ah, that all makes sense, just need to check if his tv has audio pass through or not....fingers crossed it does as that would indeed be the simplest way to set it up for him.
 
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