Does anyone know of a one-speaker type surround sound system for a small room/bedroom?
Unless you are severely tight on space, I would recommend not doing a one speaker solution. I sold the Polk Surround Bar, and some other "Flat panel speaker solutions" for a few years and they are OK. The physics, for a one speaker solution, just don't work out well for developing the large sound stage needed for most advanced surround tracks. Also keep in mind the premium price you pay for the convenience of one speaker not the quality of the audio. So if you can, look for a nice pair of bookshelf speakers over a one speaker solution. Amazing stereo is always better then bad surround. That being said, if a surround bar is the only option, the Polk Surround bar 50 is by far the best. It has the greatest L and R channel separation, while maintaining clear vocals from the center channel. Prices vary depending on where you can get it, but it is normally sold for around a $1000. Good luck, and good listening!
7 Answers
One-speaker surround sound is a bit of an oxymoron but I own the Bose Acoustic Wave music system II. The quality of the sound is great at low volume as well as when I crank it up. On Bose's site it says that this is for larger rooms but when you say a 'small room' it's all relative. They also offer a smaller Wave music system that looks like it's made for for a bedroom. I've owned a couple Bose speaker systems and the quality is definitely there without costing a ton.
Your question really depends on the price range and what you're looking for in a soundbar. You can easily spend over $1000 on soundbars by Yamaha, Denon, and Polk and there's no question that they're good quality, but at that price range, you might as well buy an actual surround sound system.
I live in a 680 sq ft apartment and after a lot of research I bought the Sony HT-CT100
It works extremely well for the space I live in. The sound quality is very good for the price point (~$250-$300), not to say that it's bad compared to a $1000 system but it doesn't pack the same "umph." It has 3 HDMI inputs and upscales to 1080p, which goes very well with my PS3 and cable. It has a subwoofer as well, which is where the HDMI inputs are.
For the money, I didn't find anything else out there that was as good as this one. The virtual surround actually works decently as well, which is an added plus because it's obviously alittle harder to give the appearance that sound is coming from 3 different directions. My one knock against it is that it doesn't get super loud, but considering I live in such a small space it really doesn't matter. Good luck.
Yamaha YAS-70BL Front Surround System
I second Evan on the price point question. It really depends on how much $$$ you want to spend. But if you want to spend under $400 then I suggest the Yamaha YAS-70BL Front Surround System ($366 off of amazon). I bought one to fill a 200-300sqft living room that has one solid wall, one sliding window wall and a 3/4 wall with open entry way. Definitely not the perfect acoustical architecture but with this soundbar I get almost perfect surround sound (sound bounce in the case of soundbars).
I was looking for 4 things in a surround sound system at my time of purchase:
1) Little to no wires
2) Under $500
3) Sounds great with minimal tweaking of settings
4) Actually reproduces "real" surround sound
I found that the Yamaha does all of these things and installed in 20mins. The sound bar fit right above our TV (can also go below) mounted on the wall and the subwoofer four feet away under a table. The only visible wires are the wires going from the TV/DVD player to the soundbar and the rest (to the subwoofer) ran under the carpet. Plug it in, turn it on and it just works. Didn't have to tweak those annoying settings like some of the other brands wanted (room size ect..), although they are there if you want to.
It sounds amazing at both high and low volumes, dvds encoded with 5.1 and those without, heck even the radio sounded good on it... and there is also an iPod/phone docking accessory you can buy to play your music/video from there if you want but I don't yet have it.
Yamaha YAS-70BL Front Surround System
Unless you are severely tight on space, I would recommend not doing a one speaker solution. I sold the Polk Surround Bar, and some other "Flat panel speaker solutions" for a few years and they are OK. The physics, for a one speaker solution, just don't work out well for developing the large sound stage needed for most advanced surround tracks. Also keep in mind the premium price you pay for the convenience of one speaker not the quality of the audio. So if you can, look for a nice pair of bookshelf speakers over a one speaker solution. Amazing stereo is always better then bad surround. That being said, if a surround bar is the only option, the Polk Surround bar 50 is by far the best. It has the greatest L and R channel separation, while maintaining clear vocals from the center channel. Prices vary depending on where you can get it, but it is normally sold for around a $1000. Good luck, and good listening!
Boston Acoustics TVee2 Soundbar Speaker System with Wireless Subwoofer -- $149.99 -- at woot today.
I would check out the Samsung HT-WS1. It's a relatively new soundbar from Samsung (released last month I think). You can demo them at just about any Best Buy, although one might argue that's hardly an environment to demo a soundbar. Anyway, it has a digital-optical input and a wireless sub. Great price and size for a smaller room. Also comes with Samsung's signature "Touch of Color" design.
What you're looking for is the Polk Audio SurroundBar.