Samsung’s soundbars have regularly won awards across the last five years, and the main reason for their success has been simply how good Samsung soundbars sound. This has been no chance development, rather the result of some serious investment.
Back in 2013, in a market where soundbars were selling on their convenience factor rather than their audio performance, Samsung set up a special team in California, taking key personnel from a number of reputable institutions as well as the hallowed hi-fi halls of Harman, a company it now owns. That team built a new Samsung Audio Lab that enshrined the highest hi-fi principles of testing and measurement. Yet the new team set to work not on some high-end stereo speaker project, but on redefining how a soundbar could perform.
The investment was wildly successful; in its very first release this regime of accurate measurement and simulation, together with custom drivers and several innovative technologies, delivered the MS-650, a mid-priced soundbar with astonishing performance.
In the years since then, each successive generation has built on those foundations, and Samsung’s soundbars have remained winners. The current Q-Series soundbars top out at the AU$1,999 HW-Q990B, which delivers an almost alarming 11.1.4-channel sound using a large bar, a subwoofer and two physical rear speakers. It sounds HUGE – just the thing to accompany the 75-inch and 85-inch TVs for which Australians are proving their appetite.
But now Samsung has returned to the Lab for a new challenge: could such big sound be created from something of a far smaller size?
The result is the S-Series, topped by the Ultra Slim design of the HW-S800B soundbar.
S is for...
Smaller. Ridiculously smaller – the S-Series S800B has a cross-section less than 4cm square, and is stylish to boot. And with Australian living rooms post-covid now often a place for exercise and work as well as entertainment, the Ultra Slim S800B offers versatility in design and functionality. Where many large soundbars look a trifle inelegant once they are wall-mounted, the S800B bar is barely deeper than a dado rail. This is one impressively discreet design.
All the more so thanks to doing away with the signal cable: the Ultra Slim S800B is capable of world-first wireless Dolby Atmos transmission, playing from a compatible Samsung TV over Wi-Fi¹.
Still sounds good. Of course it’s not hard to make a small soundbar – the trick is in making a small soundbar sound good. The S-Series succeeds – excels even. Despite its slender shape the Ultra Slim S800B delivers full 3.1.2-channel sound, with the bar’s genuine upfiring drivers allowing height delivery for Dolby Atmos or DTS Virtual:X.
Q-Symphony allows the bar to expand its performance still further by playing in concert with the sound from a compatible Samsung TV, while SpaceFit Sound+ tests room reverberations to ensure the bar performs to its best in any space. Adaptive Sound analyses the audio signal to deliver further optimised sound based on each scene.
The result of all this is crisp and clear sound: a dramatic delivery within a wide and high soundstage. Meanwhile there’s plenty of bass support from the…
S-Series subwoofer. The solid 6.4kg subwoofer with the S-Series S800B is a compact 24cm cube that can be easily positioned, receiving its signal wirelessly to deliver all the depth required for a truly cinematic sound.
Together with the Ultra Slim bar this system delivers full-range movie performance, and is even surround-ready, with an optional wireless rear speaker kit available to expand the sound system for true surround sound and total immersion.
Smart, too! The sound may be the thing, but Samsung still loads the smarts into the S-Series S800B soundbar. It works with Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa.
It can stream music using Spotify Connect, Chromecast or Apple AirPlay 2. There’s Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and compatibility with Samsung’s SmartThings app as part of a whole smart home.
And there’s a smart Game mode which provides gamers with immersive low-latency sound, promising ever more glorious victories for console or TV-streamed gaming.
Or go Q! Samsung’s flagship Q-Series soundbar systems use a larger bar, a super-subwoofer and genuine rears with upfiring drivers to achieve utterly total immersion.
Summary
The Lab makes the sound, and the sound is Samsung’s secret weapon, supplemented by significant smarts, now in an Ultra Slim soundbar. Between the Q-Series and the S-Series, Australians have options when it comes to versatile sound expansion, so they can find the right entertainment experience for their passion and lifestyle.
In the S-Series HW-S800B, Samsung has rewritten the soundbar equation. Again.
Footnotes:
1. Wireless Dolby Atmos transmission via Wi-Fi is compatible with 2022 Samsung TVs, the BU8000 and above.
