Sonos Ray Review: Best Small Soundbar

I’ve a shitty TV in my bed room. It’s previous, low cost, and sure the last of its kind. While the image high quality is dangerous, the sound high quality is even worse. However, as my editor says, most TV experiences are made higher by a soundbar, so I plugged within the new Sonos Ray. It didn’t disappoint, to say the least.

The Ray was extremely simple to arrange, paired seamlessly with my common distant, and the sound high quality is nice—I might lastly play Harry Styles from a speaker apart from my telephone. No matter what I performed, be it dialog-heavy dramas or intergalactic motion motion pictures, the crisp sound stuffed the room completely.

Sound Check

I’ve by no means owned a Sonos, so I didn’t know in regards to the “hypnotic effects” that my colleague Lauren said it has in your audio life: You purchase one, then you definitely fill your home with the issues. Still, I’ve been in proximity to them sufficient to know that they usually sound good, look good, and are well-reputed. 

It wasn’t till I really used my new soundbar that I knew what earned Sonos such gravitas within the sonic world. Simply put: The Sonos Ray was the simplest piece of electronics I’ve ever arrange. There weren’t many cords to wrangle, and the app solely took a couple of minutes to get the Ray up and working. I plugged the Ray into an outlet and linked it to my TV with the included optical cable, opened the Sonos app and adopted the straightforward prompts—essentially the most concerned immediate was to provoke Trueplay Tuning (I’ll get to that in a second). After possibly 5 minutes, all the things was over and I had Grey’s Anatomy taking part in by means of the tiny soundbar.

Trueplay tuning might sound like a technological white whale—it primarily makes use of sound the best way literal whales do to map the sound of your room—however we’ve seen this tech in Sonos audio system just like the Roam and Beam since 2015. It employs the speaker in your iPhone and the surfaces in your room to research the acoustics by bouncing sound waves round to optimize your listening expertise. You can allow this throughout your preliminary setup within the app, or you possibly can go to your system settings and begin the tuning course of later. This characteristic might not matter a lot for greater rooms, however in residences, bedrooms, and different smaller areas it will possibly actually make a distinction. The solely limitation is that it at present requires iOS.

Trueplay isn’t a gimmick. When I watched dramas like Surface, the dialog was clear because the speaker seamlessly adjusted between the present’s rating and when characters spoke. Action motion pictures are a unique beast with their many blasts and explosions, and the Ray dealt with them expertly, filling my small bed room with lightsaber swooshes and the numerous pew-pews of Star Wars. 

When it got here to queuing up a playlist, I might maintain it quiet sufficient to hear whereas I labored at my desk, or loud sufficient to listen to from the kitchen whereas doing the dishes if I wanted. All the whereas, the sound remained balanced and crisp.