Soundbars

I checked out the Sharp 2.1, and it got horrible reviews on amazon.
http://www.amazon.com/Sharp-HT-SL72-Channel-Wireless-Subwoofer/dp/B007B5RVNG

I recently purchased the Pinnacle QP9W when it was offered here a few weeks ago. Going from the rear-firing speakers on my Samsung TV to this thing made an obvious difference — but, that was expected. The speakerbar is of great quality. I used two swivel mounts to mount it right above the TV and angle it down slightly (below wasn’t an option unfortunately). It isn’t a $2000 set of Definitive speakers, but you are not going to find anything comparable to this bar for anything near this price. It does what it needs to do. Coupled with a good receiver, two small Hsu Research rear speakers and a good subwoofer, my 19x14 room fills with all the sound I could ever want.

All 3 reviews are of a technical nature and nothing to do with the quality of the product as it is advertised. They complain about it not having a remote or else having connection or crackling issues (almost always not a consistent problem, which seems to be the case since these are the only reviews mentioning it).

I purchased it a month or so ago and have had none of the problems mentioned. That said, the quality is still not amazing. The speakers are definitely not “full range” despite advertising this fact (can I get a “Holla’” from woot staff on this one???). Sound ends up a little tinny. I think it would not be a problem if you were watching a talk show, but if you watch or listen to something fuller, like with music, it sounds a little poor.

Does anyone know how to make good on a warranty? I bought a soundbar from here a couple months back. After the first week, the subwoofer has simply had a loud electronic hum that drowns out all other noise. I was actually about to simply toss it into the garbage and chalk it up to being “refurbished”.

Hi, I am Arin with PInnacle Speakers customer support and Team Leader here to assist you with any questions regarding our products. This is Pinnacle’s 37th year as a family run and operated company. I am in my 8th year here and can pretty much handle most any question, so please ask and I will assist as best I can. I also have internal access during this event to one of our engineers with 19 years experience, so if the question is super technical we can handle that too. We make terrific products. These are WOOT exclusive prices for July 4th week promo. And 1 more thing, no question is considered dumb as far as we are concerned. Ask away.

Arin, Pinnacle Speakers, Team Leader

I can’t speak for the build/sound quality of the Pinnacle speakers, but Arin (see above) answered every single question posed to him the last time these were on sale on Woot. That alone makes me more likely to purchase a Pinnacle instead of something from Sharp or BA.

…that being said, does Pinnacle publish RMS ratings for its soundbars? I’d love to know what the practical output of the speaker is.

Thank you, Our President, Rich R. is a fanatic for customer support. He’s a pretty fussy guy as a consumer and expects Pinnacle to meet his standards. It is part of our corporate culture here.

Actually, we do not. We had a long internal discussion about this and in our research we found the entire category was working with PEAK POWER ratings only. We have a view that WATTS is really pretty much meaningless as a benchmark to sonic performance. Touting larger and larger watt #'s has almost become a silly game. Our engineers hate it. HAving said that, each of our SOUNDBARS and all our products are designed from the ground up and are tested relentlessly for sound quality and durability. In the case of each of these SOUNDBARS, the PBAR 6210 has a 2 channel amp built in. Same with the Wireless subwoofer in the FRONTROW8210. I can say the ratings are PEAK in line with how this category is specified by the other players. If we used tight RMS SPEC and very low THD it would change the rating downward. In the end, the product and all our products perform to the highest standards, and they all carry power protection circuitry to prevent blowouts. Also, the SPEAKERBAR QP9W is an outstanding home theater SPEAKERBAR and will need to be driven with a receiver. The SOUNDBAR6200 and SYSTEM 8210 are all self powered with plug-N-Play easy hook-up direct to the TV. If you are doing a Home Theater, snatch QP9W, if you want to seriously upgrade the slim TV,(and slim sound that it has), the PBAR6200 and system 8210 are designed specifically for that purpose. I hope this helps.

This is how all bosses/companies should be. :slight_smile:

First, thank you for appearing as a representative of the company and explaining the decision-making process.

However, I must respectfully disagree with this stance. It would make your company appear more “serious” about this issue if the company would adopt the regulations that the FTC put out. I remember the “Watts” and “Music Power” race of the 60s and 70s, and the efforts of magazines such as Stereo Review and High Fidelity to expose these specifications as meaningless.

Also, I don’t know why companies which make sound bars (and I’m not singling your company out) believe they are above the law of the land as expressed in FTC rules. AFAIK, any company which makes a self-powered speaker system must include the FTC RMS specification as part of advertised specifications. I refer you to this quote from the Wiki article on “Audio power.”

Hi, thank you for your view. Which is in fact the views of our firm. I am not in the legal department so I cannot speak to any of this, but imagine the ability to sell a product where everyone says PEAK power and nothing more, and we show say 20% of that power. As I said, the regrettable part is WATTS are very misunderstood. And even within the guidelines you quote, there is plenty of wiggle room. We have been in this industry for 37 years and try our best and are respected for being conservative in our specs, and “NON HYPED” in the way we describe our products. We tend to use many less adjectives than most other companies and let the product performance and our stellar reputation tell the story. I know our ratings are consistant with what the industry is doing at this point in time in this category. We also have spec data from our suppliers that substantiate our ratings. Watts have no bearing on acoustics and we do not play it up as part of the product. If you look at the way we describe our product attributes WATTS is not close to the top. For example, we include the internal view for our Powered Subwoofer in FRONTROWSYS8210, we do that to show we put a lot more into our product than most others given a price range and category. Still, your points are well taken. We appreciate you writing directly, to which we gave an honest answer. Most others would probably ignore the question.

I purchased the “Boston Acoustics TVee 26 Soundbar with Wireless Subwoofer” last month for my living room - and I must say I have been extremely impressed. I was holding out until I could install a full surround sound system…but there’s always something else to spend the money on. So, instead of continuing to deal with the crappy TV speakers - I pounced on this soundbar. I’m super happy I did. It has been a great $120 spent. It’s a COMPLETELY different movie viewing experience. The sound is crisp, the booms really BOOM, and there’s no sudden mid-movie need to strain to hear wtf people are saying.

I’ve found the positive reviews on Amazon to be accurate: http://www.amazon.com/Boston-Acoustics-TVEE-26-Theater/dp/B008VOPC1O/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1373054836&sr=8-1&keywords=Boston+Acoustics+TVee+26+Soundbar+with+Wireless+Subwoofer

The only negative I’ve found is that I can no longer tell what level the sound is starting at when I turn on my TV. Meaning…when I just used my TV speakers the sound went from 0-70. When I’d turn on my TV I’d be able to see how loud it was by the number it was set at - so I could quickly mute it before it started blaring. [This is important for those mornings I get up and play video games before the wife rolls out of bed.] I am without that luxury now, but I’ll deal. :wink:

Seriously, great deal. This will absolutely hold me over until I’m finally ready to drop the $$ on a complete system.

I’m considering the Pinnacle 6200. I have a 42" Panasonic LCD in the bedroom, and the sound is pretty much what you’d expect. But, it’s not the home theatre.

90% of the time, I’m getting by with my Tivo remote, and maybe 10% of the time add in the Blu-ray remote…

I don’t really want “yet another remote”, and so far have avoided the hassle of setting up a universal remote on that TV.

Would the Tivo remote be able to drive the volume up/down on the Pinnacle 6200?

If not, install goes from “setup in 8 minutes or less” to “setup requires extreme patience and a Logitech remote”, which are pretty much at opposite ends of the spectrum…

Hi, The TIVO remote would not adjust the volume with our PBAR 6200. However Universal Remote can be programmed to accept our product and the other products you have in 1 remote. BRAND IS UNIVERSAL REMOTE

This is the one I was looking at. The amp is built in right? So it just plug and play?

Sorry to be the Pinnacle combo breaker, but I’ve got a question about the AudioSource S325 80W Soundbar Speaker System I bought from here a few months back. It’s now not working. When it’s turned on the volume goes to 0. The volume function works on both the remote and the soundbar, but the volume will just go back down to 0 every time. Anyone else have this problem or have a solution?

Yep, exactly.

You could also control the volume with your TV remote just by connecting your TV’s headphone or variable RCA audio outputs to the soundbar.