Sunday 25 July 2010

Sony Home Theater - wireless speakers, sony home theater


Works great! Haven't tested a 3D movie yet, but the sound is amazing. Easy to hook up. The S-Air really works without a glich. Goes great with my Sony setup: XBR60LX900 3D HDTV with active shutter glasses and the PS3 (to include 3D Gaming - wipEout HD is awesome!). It has two HDMI inputs and one HDMI output, perfect for me - PS3 and DirecTV box connect to the HTS, then the HTS connects to the TV. Now the only slight problem is that the device is a bit slow to remote commands when switching inputs, e.i. HDMI1, HDMI2, FM Tuner, BD player... and to the Menu (PS3 type). Other than that... simply amazing! Sony BDV-HZ970W Blu-ray Player Home Entertainment System [3D Compatible]

I bought the Sony Blu-ray all in one system to replace a 10 year old Pioneer AV system. I loved the Pioneer system, but after ten years I had to turn up the volume considerably louder than I had to in when I first bought it and the lights on the player wouldn't light up anymore. I also bought a 60 inch Sony Bravia TV and wanted a system that would benefit from compatibility of Sony components.



One thing that surprised me with the Sony system was the base box did not have a plug. I couldn't believe the base didn't require it's own power. Over all the sound is good, but as good as I remember my Pioneer in it's hey day.



The good points:



*Easiest stereo system to hookup. The wires are color coded for each component and the directions do a great job on how to set up the system.

*It works seamlessly with my Sony Bravia TV. The TV remote controls everything, sound, Blu-ray player, and TV without needing to do anything.

*Works great with the Apple TV version 2. It comes with the Sony brand internet option for Netflix, but I prefer to use Apple TV. Instead of buying the Sony cradle for iphone/iPod Touch just buy the $99 Apple TV and use Airplay. It works great.



Addition Info added 5DEC2010:Bought S-CN5000 and SS-F7000 to replace center and left/right front speakers and boy what a difference it makes.

*Sound is easy to calibrate with included Mic.

*Design, I really like how the components look like the obelisk in 2001: A Space Odyssey. The Blu-ray player looks sharp, it is easy to read alerts when needed otherwise not intrusive. Very Zen form factor.

*Blu-ray player does a nice job up-scaling DVDs.

*Two HDMI inputs, since my TV has 6 HDMI inputs the two on the system are just gravy. The system produces great surround sound even if the components are plugged into the HDMI ports on the TV and not on the Blu-ray/AV receiver.

*The wireless back speakers are a really awesome touch. It is nice not to worry about the speaker cables running from the TV to the davenport.



Things I wish were better:



*Sound, I wish I bought better speakers and since speakers use a unique clip format, I am not sure if I can upgrade the speakers. (I may be able to hook up better speakers by just using the speaker wire that came with the system, the clip into the system is a unique clip but the two ends of speaker wire that go into the speakers looks like plain old speaker wire)

*The Speaker stand doesn't look sturdy but it is.



I love the system but I am having buyers remorse. I wish I would have bought the Sony SA-VS350H 5.1/7.1-Channel' Home Theater Speaker System (Amazon sells the speakers at nearly half off) and a Sony AV receiver. I don't own a single Blu-ray and I am content with the HD quality on Apple TV although no where near as good as Blu-ray. Over all I gave the system 5 stars for the design, perfect integration with my Sony TV, and makes Apple TV awesome.

I've waited to review its 3D performance to write this review. Turns out, it's awesome!

Sound is very solid, esp from those tiny speakers.

I've tried 10+ HD audio blu-ray movies and they sounded just great.

Its 3D video OUT is good enough not to affect my samsung 7000 series 3D plasma performance.



The 2 things I would complain about:

1. It's really slow. load disc, or go to menu, etc... just slow.

2. The digital audio cable input, has a weird requirement of only being used when video is coming from the TV channel. So what about other devices?? I've got around the problem by tricking the receiver -- having another device sending the video to the TV, and then the digital output directly to this receiver's digital audio input. and then use the TV input channel.

This is my first home theater system and I simply love it. Set up was easy except the wireless internet, but I still ended up using wired connection for internet for good speed. Speakers sound great. Blueray player is good. Netflix, youtube, pandora all work great after I got the wired internet. System recognized the new version of software and the upgrade was smooth and took roughly 15 minutes. I didn't try the 3D yet.





I had to enter the following settings manually to connect to internet using wireless adapter provided with the system.

Subnet Mask

Default gateway

Primary DNS

IP address

To get these settings, open your laptop, Click Start > Run, type "cmd" and hit enter. It will open the command prompt window. In the window, type "ipconfig" and hit enter. Then look for the above settings. For Ip address, take the setting from the laptop and change the last digists and make sure its not already taken by your other laptops or desktops, for example if your laptop is using 192.168.1.2, use something like 192.168.1.22 for the home theater. Once I entered the settings manually, I was able to connect to my router, but the signal strength was too low and so the system kept disconnecting all the time. But note that I have a wireless g router which is almost 3 years old, ofcourse it still works great for my laptop. May be if you have a Wireless N router you might get a better signal for the home theater reciver.

Anyway I ended up moving my modem and router to the living room, I used a splitter to split my single coaxial cable so that one can go to cable box and the other one can go to the modem. And I connected my modem to the router and a ethernet cable from my router to the home theater. This time I chose Auto option for the network settings and the speed is good. - Wireless Speakers - Youtube - Sony Home Theater - Home Theater System'


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