We want to enjoy movies at home with friends and family and while doing so we want a more immersive cinematic experience. Having that kind of robust cinematic experience at home requires a good TV and sound system. Previously, this was achieved through Home Theatre, but setting up home theatre was not easy, and required extra devices. And, since TVs lack a decent sound system nowadays, the soundbar is the solution to this.
The market is almost filled with a lot of soundbars from brands like Sony, Samsung, Philips, Yamaha, Sonos, Bose, Vizio, and Pioneer. Among all these branded soundbars and other soundbars in the market, the Dolby Atmos Enabled soundbars offer a more immersive listening experience. They are also the most pricey and luxurious of all kinds of soundbars due to the technology and sound it gives out. In this article, we will be talking about a Dolby Atmos Enabled sound system from LG. It is only just a new product in the market but has many promises to serve the consumers.
LG is one of the most popular and consumer favorite electric goods manufacturers with a long line of consumer electronic products. In 2017, they’ve partnered up with Meridian Technology to leverage their unrivaled sound technology and pioneering approach to audio to deliver unique sound solutions that will provide listeners with an unsurpassed entertainment experience. Recently they have brought the LG SK10Y soundbar with meridian sound and Dolby Atmos technology. The soundbar has a brushed metallic design that gives it a stunning look and contributes to its premium looks.
The LG SK10Y is a soundbar with forwarding, side, and upward-firing drivers with a total of 550-watt output 5.1.2 audio channel. The speakers are placed strategically to provide more immersive sound, and two of them are placed on top that fires the sound up to reflect the sound from the upper wall to create even more thrilling effects. This soundbar is also coupled with a 200-watt wireless sub-woofer making the whole woofer a massive 550-watt sound system. The LG SK10Y is also a Wireless Surround Ready soundbar that is upgraded and designed to integrate with the SPK8-S optional wireless surround speakers to create more premium home theater experience with wireless convenience.
This soundbar provides an amazing, realistic sound as the audio is processed with Meridian technology that combines advanced signal processing and hardware design to expand image height and widen the sound field, with custom Clear Vocal and Enhanced Bass presets that provides uncompromising performance. With Hi-Resolution Audio, this soundbar offers higher sampling rates and bit depth. It can play back lossless stereo audio at up to 24-bit/192kHz quality, contributing to more accurate and enjoyable music listening. And with the Dolby Atmos, the sound can move anywhere in three-dimensional space, allowing the listener to experience the ultimate surround sound.
This soundbar also supports Google Chromecast and works seamlessly with popular music apps like Pandora and Google Play Music, Spotify, enabling wireless audio from a compatible phone or tablet, iPhone, iPad, Mac or Windows laptop, or Chromebook. With Google Assistant, you can play music, skip tracks, and adjust the volume on your Sound Bar with your voice. But for that, you would need to connect the soundbar to a Google Assistant enabled device. And, as 4K is becoming the new standard in TVs, this speaker has a 4K passthrough allowing users to experience full 4K home theater from streaming, disc, and beyond. The LG SK10Y will cost you around 700 dollars on Amazon right now. Although when it first came into the market, the soundbar was priced at around 1100 dollars.
In April, LG released 6 new soundbars, LG SL10G being the upgrade of the LG SK10Y. The newer model has essentially everything the LG SK10Y came with. The only difference is that sub-woofer is now 220-watt instead of 200-watt. And the LG SL10G soundbar now has Google Assistant built-in, which was missing in the LG SK10Y and another Google Assistant enabled device was required. With LG SL10G, you would not require any extra devices and can turn on your TV with voice command through the soundbar. There are two more new soundbars with both Meridian Audio and Dolby Atmos sound system. They differ from the SL10G model in terms of audio channel and price.
The LG SK10Y is a feature-enriched soundbar that works really well with all the TVs and syncs really well. It also comes at a really good price point and is available online at around 700 dollars. The LG SK10Y soundbar is quite good, being new in this segment. Yet, it lacks overall performance and doesn’t offer anything unique than the existing soundbars in the market. Soundbars from Sony, Yamaha, or Sennheiser offer a great sound experience that is unparalleled to anything in the market. But they are pricey as well. While Sonos, Vizio, Pioneer, and Bose offer soundbars at a more affordable price range with great sound quality. In fact, there are a lot of other soundbars available in the market at this price point that offers great sound quality with good features. If you decide not to go with Dolby Atmos, then there will be more speakers for you to choose from, and at a much lower price point. So, in a nutshell, LG is not providing anything that is outstanding either in terms of technology, quality, performance, or value.
If you have LG TV or other LG products and have brand loyalty towards LG, this soundbar might be appealing to you. But it does not come with anything out of the ordinary or exceptional, for that matter. LG is desperately trying to get into sound technology. And their lineup of soundbars and speakers is definitely a good start. However, to sustain in this market filled with competition, LG needs to make a point for customers to buy their soundbars and speakers over the competition. And that is a point, which is missing from LG at this moment.
