Sound Bar Recommendations

TylerD321 · September 27, 2023

I have a tv in my living room that I routinely have to turn all the way up in order to be able to hear. I’m not sure if it is dang Hulu’s fault or what.

As I rent, I am unable to mount my tv on the wall and it has to sit in an area that is built into the house, so I can’t get a bigger tv. That means I have to put the sound bar under the tv, there is no room in front of it.

The size of room I have under the legs is approximately 32 inches wide and 2.5 inches tall. (There is technically 2.75 inches but I don’t want to interfere with remote connectivity).

I am willing to spend 200 usd or so (located in the US, prefer Amazon). I am open to options without subwoofer, or with - as long as it is wireless as I would put it by my couch. I can go a little over budget if it would greatly change sound quality and volume.

My tv has HDMI in eARC and a digital audio out port. Either of these options are valid. What would you guys recommend?

ender23 · September 29, 2023

Frankly you're going to have a hard time picking anything that will perform worse than your built in TV speakers.

I know rtings has a comprehensive list of soundbars they've tested for under $200 (I'm not sure if I can link to their site or not). The Vizio M Series M215aw-K6 and Vizio V Series V51X-j6 are ranked near the top. Both will easily fit under your TV but are wider by about 2 inches on either side (36" wide).

If you really can't fit that width you could also try the Bose Solo 5 which is only 21.6" wide, but it's 2.6" high. You could always shim under the TV legs if the speaker height does actually block the IR on the TV.

I have an older Vizio on our smaller TV and it does the job in terms of boosting dialog.

TylerD321 · September 29, 2023

56 minutes ago, ender23 said:

Frankly you're going to have a hard time picking anything that will perform worse than your built in TV speakers.

I know rtings has a comprehensive list of soundbars they've tested for under $200 (I'm not sure if I can link to their site or not). The Vizio M Series M215aw-K6 and Vizio V Series V51X-j6 are ranked near the top. Both will easily fit under your TV but are wider by about 2 inches on either side (36" wide).

If you really can't fit that width you could also try the Bose Solo 5 which is only 21.6" wide, but it's 2.6" high. You could always shim under the TV legs if the speaker height does actually block the IR on the TV.

I have an older Vizio on our smaller TV and it does the job in terms of boosting dialog.

I actually ended up picking a Samsung sound bar up from Best Buy yesterday. It was the largest one that could fit under my tv. I am shockingly very happy with it.

Samsung C Series 2.1ch DTS Virtual: X Soundbar Titan Black HW-C450 - Best Buy