Gadgetory

hey I'm Matthew Muscovy AK from C net and today we're going to take a look at the yamaha ysp 1400 this is a $400 sound bar and it's the least expensive model and Yamahas digital sound projector live the promise is a true surround sound experience from a sound bar well it looks like a pretty typical sound bar from the outside the design is actually pretty unconventional there's just a small speaker grille on the center and it covers up an array of eight 1.13 inch drivers and those drivers are used to beam sound off of nearby walls and furniture to create the surround sound effect there are also two legs on the sound bar and each has a three point two five inch subwoofer that means there's no separate wireless subwoofer which is good for getting rid of an extra box but it's not great for making deep bass the included remote is a good one it has a solid heft and important buttons like volume and inputs are nicely separated around back there's also an IR repeater so if the sound bar blocks your TV's remote sensor the Yamaha can still repeat those signals out the back so you can still control your TV also on the back are the sound bars inputs you get optical coaxial analog and mini jack that's plenty if you connect all of your devices directly to your TV then connect its output to your sound bar but with the YSP 1400 that doesn't work as well as it usually does the issue is most TVs actually dumb down incoming audio signals to stereo which isn't good news for a sound bar that specializes in virtual surround basically if you want the full surround effect you'll need to connect all your devices directly to the sound bar or use a workaround like an HDMI switcher that includes an optical audio output neither is really ideal aside from the physical inputs there's also built-in Bluetooth so you can wirelessly stream audio from nearly any smartphone or tablet and there's also decoding for both Dolby Digital and DTS which is needed for listening to those surround sound tracks as for sound quality the YSP 1400 doesn't quite create the true surround effects that Yamahas more expensive ysp sound bars are known for now that's not surprising as a step-up ysp 2200 has double the number of drivers and the high-end ysp 4300 goes all the way up to 22 drivers the YSP 1400 does sound considerably more spacious than the standard 2.1 sound bar like Sony's HD CT 260 but just don't expect to hear sounds coming from behind your head otherwise the YSP 1400 has a crisp and clear sound with movies and the unifying feature does a great job of limiting dynamic spikes in volume so it's great for listening late at night on the other hand the lack of a separate subwoofer means you're not going to get real deep or powerful bass although it still has a reasonably full range sound so there's a lot to like about the YSP 1400 but the big hurdle is you need a way to get it a true surround signal for it to sound its best if you don't have a lot of devices or you're okay with using a workaround it's definitely worth considering but the average buyer will probably be better off with a simpler solution I'm Matthew moscovia from CNET and this is the yamaha ysp 1400