TV sound upgrade in a corner

neil_g · 2 Aug 2018 at 13:00

I'm fed up with the poor performance from my TV speakers. Dialogue gets lost and overall volume is poor.

My TV is in a corner (in before "chav" comments) so I am fairly restricted for space.

I was looking at something like the Yamaha SRT-1500 sound base which will fit on the unit and under the TV, however reviewing the manual this states not to position in a corner because the sound reflection will not work.

Another option was the Sonos Beam, this will just fit in front of the TV and not hang over the edge of the unit like a full size bar. Reviews seem to be largely positive.

Am I missing a trick here, is there a better single unit option? I have ARC and optical outputs, most content sources are FreeSat and Netflix for TV and Film and Spotify for music. Moving the TV is not currently an option the other half would entertain.

To give an idea of what I have to work with..

hornetstinger · 2 Aug 2018 at 13:11

What about a q acoustic qtv2 if you can find one as second hand

Armageus · 2 Aug 2018 at 13:28

Separate speakers placed either side + av receiver not an option?

AV Receiver would open up more options with regards to boosting Dialog channel or changing Dynamic Range as well.

TheVoice · 2 Aug 2018 at 13:31

My parents used to have a Panasonic soundbase that looks like it might fit into that compartment in your TV unit, it produced impressive sound and bass considering it was fairly small.

neil_g · 2 Aug 2018 at 14:21

had an onkyo and kef 5.1 previously and receiver and speakers isn't an option this time.

if I can get a single unit that sounds decent for the price of a beam or srt-1500 then happy days.

lucid · 2 Aug 2018 at 22:43

The reason why the SRT1500 isn't recommended for corner locations is the wall angles in the rest of the room.

The Yamaha uses an array of tiny speakers which focus sound and bounce it off the walls at specific points to create phantom surround speakers. There's a limit to the reflection ngles that will allow this to work. A corner TV means that the angles are wrong or difficult to start with. That's going to ruin the effect.

A less sophisticated sound bar or one that pushes a bit of sound out from the sides as well as forward in the hope that it bounces towards the listener might be a better option.

neil_g · 3 Aug 2018 at 12:56

Yeah that's basically what I read regarding the yamaha. Why I was considering the beam, you can tune that to some degree with the app.

neil_g · 20 Aug 2018 at 09:48

Got the yamaha in the end, came up on the purple lot ebay outlet for less than half price because of damaged packaging.

Sounds great.

billystanton · 20 Aug 2018 at 12:25

I know you already purchased now, but just incase anybody else falls onto this thread and needs similar help, I just picked up a Sonos Beam, and the sound is great. Speakers at the side of the unit really help push the sound around the room.

Especially after the iPhone tuning!