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Soundbars:It’s a sleek, thin, modern-styled powered speaker that is located directly below your brand new flat-panel TV which significantly improves the audio experience without the complexity of an entire home theater set up that involves hanging surround speakers, running wires, etc. Like DVD receivers and iPod® docking stations before them — which emerged many years ago and now are considered a standard product category within the consumer electronics universe — soundbars are at the beginning of a new growth wave that will become a solid market segment. Soundbars have broken into the home theater scene by offering an intriguing value proposition. They bridge the gap between the complete audio shortcomings of the HDTV and high-end home theater systems featuring Early entrants into the “active” or “amplified soundbar” market, have rightly recognized that for soundbars to gain acceptance by consumers they too must adhere to the principles that made flat-panel TVs so successful: sleek, minimalist designs that deliver a step up in performance compared to the integrated TV audio system. In the HDTV space, LCDs and plasmas were a significant step forward in technology, quality, size, weight and appearance compared to their CRT and projection system brethren. Likewise, soundbars are finding their niche because they are a significant step-up in sound quality compared to integrated HDTV speakers. Most importantly, they don’t require the chunk of change or sacrifices in visual aesthetics as in home theater systems. Many consumers also shy away from surround-sound systems (HTiBs or AVRs with passive speakers) because of the complicated design, wiring and installation headaches that often come with the commitment to achieve the complete “home theater experience.” To contrast, more and more soundbars are incorporating a wireless subwoofer allowing for freedom of placement within the room. Soundbars are delivering a solid audio experience in a way that makes it easy, attractive and cost effective—plus they’re delivering on the not-to-be- overlooked factor of spousal approval. The industry has recognized that many households simply don’t want — or don’t have the physical structures or budget—to support a complex home theater system, especially in secondary or tertiary installations. To this audience, soundbars are finding a strong market. At the OEM level, what’s interesting is that this market has no current incumbent majority market leader today. The game is wide open for success, and the field of players is not limited to just the traditional speaker manufacturers. Even HDTV manufacturers are looking very hard at soundbars, believing they have a unique advantage compared to other manufacturers because they can develop soundbars that are an extension of their branded TVs, with an integrated remote control and more seamless operation. Other market players include premium electronics brand manufacturers and companies who have made their name in peripheral products, such as docking stations. It makes a lot of sense that soundbars will be successful too. Big box CE retailers have recently given considerable shelf space to soundbars. To these retailers, soundbars offer an excellent sales opportunity — especially as measured by the benchmark revenue per square foot — with strong margins for all the players. For soundbars to prove their worthiness, they have to give consumers a perceived measure of performance improvement compared to the TV audio itself (hence the very reason for their existence), and product designers and marketers would do well to remember that in retail outlets competitive products will often sit side-by-side and be judged by consumers — much like after-market automotive audio systems. First, if you’re making a basic product, such as a two speaker system, at minimum you’re looking at having a stereo analog interface and possibly some other audio input such as S/PDIF. Remember that this product is all about blending seamlessly with the sleek and slim TV design, and so going with Class-D amplifier technology is a foregone conclusion. Class A/B amplifiers just won’t cut it when it comes to conforming to slim form factors while meeting the power requirements of even the lowest cost soundbar designs on the market today due to heat generation issues from this inefficient amplifier technology. Fifteen watts/channel output for stereo or 2.1 channel configurations is a minimum in order to compete with HDTVs that are already offering ten watts/channel, albeit the drivers and cabinet will go a long way to improving the audio along. From there, mid-range models with at least three speakers will require Class-D solutions offering at least 45 to 90 W of total output power. Typically, mid-range models also offer a separate wireless powered subwoofer option, which can have output power ranging from 50 W upto250W. More advanced soundbars will start to incorporate more speakers, both for improved sound quality as well as to incorporate surround-sound decoding functionality. They’ll need to incorporate HDMITM 1.3A (or later) in order to support high bit-rate bitstream outputs from the latest Blu-ray Disc® players, offer wireless subwoofer connectivity and perhaps be ready for peripherals such as iPod and Sirius®/XM® satellite radio. Some high-end products today are even incorporating Blu-ray Disc playback directly. We can work with an array of different Wireless designers, Audio processing, and electronics solutions which include on board power supplies therefore avoiding the “Wall Lump” We have good working relationships with Chip suppliers like Cirrus Logic to ensure features, design and cost are adhered to. |
