The Polk Audio Ultra-Slim Soundbar with Wireless Subwoofer redefines your home audio experience with premium sound quality and a space-saving design. Equipped with 5 powerful full-range drivers, this soundbar produces crystal-clear dialogue, dynamic sound, and deep, resonant bass from the included wireless subwoofer. Polk’s exclusive VoiceAdjust technology ensures voices remain clear and balanced, while Dolby Digital decoding enhances every scene with surround sound precision.
Standing just over 2 inches tall, this ultra-slim soundbar easily fits in front of your TV without blocking the screen or IR remote sensor. It can also be conveniently wall-mounted for a clean and modern look. Whether you’re watching movies, streaming music, or gaming, this soundbar delivers an immersive audio experience.
Connectivity is seamless with HDMI ARC, optical input, and AUX ports, making it easy to connect to your TV and other devices. With built-in Bluetooth technology, you can wirelessly stream music directly from your smartphone, tablet, or favorite apps like Spotify and Pandora.
Setting up the Polk Audio Soundbar is effortless with the included HDMI and optical cables. In just minutes, you’ll enjoy powerful, room-filling sound without the hassle of complicated installations.
Upgrade your home theater with the Polk Audio Ultra-Slim Soundbar and Wireless Subwoofer — where sleek design meets exceptional audio performance.
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I would like to have more control of the sound. You can only control the bass setting. It gives you 3 levels of filters for vocals and a music/movie setting. It would be nice to have a 5 channel EQ or a way to adjust the speaker levels. But if you want that your going to pay 2x as much.
I am happy with this system.
The sub is lacking. Not very powerful and the sound quality could be better, it just sounds kind of cheap. Overall I think it’s definitely better than the TV speakers.
Everything works perfectly so far.
The only reason I'm not giving it five stars is because the subwoofer cabinet is made of pressed particle wood kind of cheesy and cheap, for the money they could have put it in a real wood or laminate cabinet. Just my opinion.
Sound is great especially with the voice adjustment button.
Only thing I don’t like is their remote, but that’s a personal preference
We suggest you look elsewhere as in a Sony especially for the money.
I wanted to love this but I just can’t.
This is definitely a big improvement in sound (volume, clarity and bass) over what were already pretty nice sounding built in television speakers which I listen to at about volume level 9 (of 100) for casual daily YouTube videos. I can bring it to level 13 when wanting to be more immersed in Netflix and such. I don’t need much volume in my home (though in my car I have a 12” subwoofer and play music at 75% volume LOL).
VOLUME: The sound bar can get much louder and with that extra volume it stays more clear without being distorted unlike the built-in television speakers that start to sound distorted when it gets 50% and above in volume.
REMOTE CONTROL: This soundbar CAN be controlled with my TVs remote so long as it’s connected not just with the optical audio cable but the HDMI cable as well going into an ARC HDMI port on the tv. The soundbar turns on when I turn on my tv and turns off when I turn off my tv.
I don’t see a volume level on the soundbar which is my first complaint about the soundbar. It’s also not on my tv when using the soundbar. I just see a + or - on the tv when I press those buttons.
EQ (ISSUE 1): Sadly there is no real EQ settings on this. There are several buttons on the REMOTE ONLY (not on the soundbar itself) that have 6 custom sound settings: Movie, Night, TV, voice 1, voice 2 and voice 3. I’m not sure if you can combine these. I switched to “night” and then “voice 3” thinking that maybe it would simply enhance the voice on night mode but when I press night mode again it resets the voice setting. So I think it’s either or. And as a 7th choice you have your bass volume. Thats the extent of EQ options.
When using the built in speakers the TV had tons and tons of options with 5 frequency sliders (for sub bass, bass, mids, high mids and treble), surround sound, magic sound, add bass, add treble… so much. That’s all greyed out when using the optical audio out to this soundbar. I don’t know if all of those settings would still be there if I got an LG sound bar with my LG television. But considering I don’t know what brand of television will be my next, I couldn’t worry myself with matching the soundbar brand.
So far, I guess it doesn’t matter that there aren’t as many EQ settings, the speaker sounds pretty good as is. I leave it on “Movie” for everything. I have my Apple Music hooked up on the television but haven’t used it for music yet, I presume I would want to put the soundbar on the music setting for that.
ISSUE 2: I am not sure is an issue with the speaker or the television but when watching YouTube for example, if you are on the YouTube menu, there is no audio signal being sent to the speaker and thus you see single white dot of light. When you have clicked on a video and the audio signal is sent to the sound bar, the single white light turns green. The PROBLEM is that there is a fraction of a delay after the video has started before the sound starts on the speaker. There are many videos I watched that for some reason has someone speaking from the very first frame of video and the sound bar always misses it, the sound turning on 1-2 words late into the video. It has nothing to do with speaking specifically, whatever the sound is in the video, the speaker doesn’t activate until a fraction of a second after the video starts. It’s a bit jarring, and a little more annoying. If I rewind the video to the beginning I’m just repeating the situation because rewinding means there is no audio signal going to the speaker and so I see the white dot again, that once again doesn’t turn green until a fraction of a second after the video starts again.
But aside from those issues, it really does sound good and I haven’t felt a need to crank up the base much because it sounds pretty full as is, without sounding too bassy or muffled. I experimented with the voice enhancement buttons. I’ve settled on “voice 2” to bring just a little bit more clarity and audibility to the voices when I have the volume a bit lower so as not to disturb others.
It sounds good, I can make it louder than ever before if I want. I can control its volume and on/off without needing its remote (though I need its remote for the other EQ settings). I got it “open box” but it looked brand new I must say for $143.80 which is a good price for what this is. And I trust the Polk brand.
Pros:
-Connectivity: I’d say this soundbar is “plug and play”. Had absolutely no issue connecting to my TCL TV utilizing the provided HDMI ARC cable. I’ve read that the TCL TV’s can be a little finicky when it comes to connection of external devices such as this. I’d venture to guess that if it connects this easy to mine, it should connect to yours just as easily. Make sure to adjust the setting on your tv accordingly for whatever connection you utilize. The provided remote control is self explanatory and very easy to use. Depending on your individual setup, your tv remote can be utilized (if you use HDMI ARC or Optical) to control the unit, and the Polk remote can still be utilized to adjust the sound mode, bass, and volume in these configurations. The unit powers on and off automatically using the HDMI ARC configuration. The Bluetooth subwoofer was very easy to connect to the soundbar and I haven’t experienced any issues with it losing the connection. Also connected to my phone with no issue.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
-Flexibility: Polk provides just about every necessary cable to connect to your particular tv. The only one they don’t provide is an AUX audio cable (headphone style). I wouldn’t recommend using this type of connection if you want optimal sound quality, but it is something to consider if that’s the only connection you have available.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
-Aesthetics: The Polk S2 is very sleek and clean in appearance. No extra “bling”, which I appreciate. The soundbar is slim enough that it would look nice bottom mounted or wall mounted, without looking cheesy or out of place in any room with any decor. The subwoofer is not huge and relatively slim, so that it can be concealed almost anywhere, however, placement of the subwoofer will greatly affect bass response. It features a single blue-green light to indicate that the unit is “on”, and a classy looking “Polk” badge on the soundbar.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
-Reliability: I have had zero issues with this unit. No loss of connection, no technical issues, malfunctions, or failures. Very easy to set up and use.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
-Sound Quality: For this portion, I will separate the sound quality of the soundbar, and the sound quality of the subwoofer.
Soundbar: The Polk S2 soundbar sounds very crisp and clear. Frequency response is decent. It’s lacking super bright highs, probably because it uses full-range speakers to handle all sound rather than having separate tweeters. Midrange response is good and vocals are easy to hear when adjusted correctly to your ear. Bass response from the actual soundbar is next to nothing, and primarily handled by the subwoofer. I’d venture to guess that Polk purposefully used some sort of crossover in the soundbar to eliminate distortion incurred from the tiny soundbar speakers trying to reproduce bass notes. Movie sound effects and music sound really good, and the unit is plenty loud for almost any sized room. I have turned the unit up quite loud, and haven’t noticed any distortion or clipping from the soundbar, which my ears are very sensitive to. Could be my OCD, but if it were there, I would hear it, and it would really bother me. I did observe a very noticeable drop in volume and sound quality when connecting my phone via Bluetooth and playing music. Bluetooth connection inherently does not have the same bandwidth as a hard connection, but with this unit, it really stands out. I only use this connection occasionally, so it’s not a huge deal for me, but depending on how you plan on using this unit, it may be worth considering. The Polk remote has a feature that allows the user to increase the loudness of vocals, which comes in handy when watching tv shows and movies. The 3 sound modes (movie, music, and night mode) work fairly well, but I would have preferred a “custom” setting as well. My ear tells me that “music” mode enhances bass and treble, “movie” mode is similar to the “loudness” feature on some home and car stereos where output is boosted across the board, with a little decrease in mid bass, and “night” mode dulls the sound across the board, assuming this is to cut mainly bass response to avoid disturbing other people in the house. I find “night” mode to be fairly useless. It sounds to me like you disconnected the soundbar and went back to using the stock tv speakers. Personally, like I said, I’d prefer this feature scrapped and replaced with a custom setting. Overall, it sounds really good, and is a drastic improvement over the stock tv speakers, but if you’re looking for audiophile quality music reproduction, this probably isn’t the unit for you.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Subwoofer: Considering the size of the subwoofer (5.25” driver) and small size of the subwoofer’s ported cabinet, it does its job pretty well. The amount of bass an individual user likes is very subjective, so this is simply my evaluation based on my preference. The subwoofer provides decent bass response. Sound effects, like explosions, in movies are really brought forward. It sounds like it is tuned to handle all bass frequencies (mid-bass down). This can cause the unit to sound a little muddy at times. It lacks the ability to accurately reproduce the very low “lows”. In my living room setting, it is “feelable” and sends a small vibration through the floor, which in my opinion, helps with the overall movie experience. I have noticed a bit of distortion if I turn the bass all the way up and turn the volume up very loud. I heard a bit of a “flutter” from the sub. It didn’t sound like port noise, it sounded like the tiny driver was protesting how hard I was pushing it. I couldn’t get the unit to “clip”, and I’d guess that if I turned it up loud enough to do so, the driver would melt down before any clipping occurred. At normal listening levels, I did not hear any port noise or distortion. My living room is small, and the unit is placed next to my couch, but I’d guess that in a larger living room, it may not provide the same feel as it does in mine. I mentioned the placement of the subwoofer earlier…this is important. I had to really play with placement to get the most out of this unit. That isn’t a knock on this particular subwoofer, and is true with most home subs. I do think it is more important with units such as this that use a very small driver and don’t have a huge built-in amp. I started with this unit placed next to my couch, between an ottoman and the wall, with the port facing a corner approximately 15” away. I could hear and feel the bass ONLY when I was sitting on the couch. If I stood up, it sounded like someone shut the sub off. I moved it under an end table, port facing another corner approximately 8” away. This made a huge difference. My living room isn’t the best for finding a spot to put a subwoofer, but I’d say that it’s important to corner load this unit if you want to get the best response from it. Is it going to give you brain-rattling bass? No. Are you going to hear those super clear, punchy plucks of a bass guitar, or feel kick drums and explosions pounding in your chest? No. It provides a nice, distortion-free addition to the soundbar and rounds everything out, that’s about it. It’s not disappointing, but it’s not mind-blowing. Considering the price, and size of the driver, it’s good.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
In closing, I am happy with the Polk S2. You can’t purchase a “budget” soundbar and expect “high dollar” performance. The S2 met my expectations in most areas. Polk put out a quality product at a great price. If you are wanting perfect, movie theater-quality volume and audio response, and bass that makes you feel like you’re having a heart attack, look elsewhere and spend more. If you’re wanting a user-friendly, easy to set up unit that sounds really good, the Polk S2 is worth your hard-earned dollar. Buyers with very large living rooms, audiophiles who are accustomed to “the best of the best”, and bass-heads, may want to look elsewhere and spend a few extra dollars to get what you’re looking for. Buyers who want a great product at a great price, for use in a small to medium sized living room or bedroom…I’d say this is one of, if not THE best soundbar/subwoofer combo on Amazon. As long as you use common sense and keep your expectations from the Polk S2 reasonable for the price point, you won’t be disappointed.
To optimize the listening experience, the sound-bar should be mounted a few inches below the TV. Wiring can be smoothly routed in a tidy bundle using a cable sleeve. The speakers arrive in unique packaging, like a musical instrument; which I suppose they are.
Note: not getting a sub-woofer with any soundbar was never an option, as others have said here, without a sub-woofer, why even get a soundbar?
Brief history, I have had POLK for decades, not the cheapest, but not the most expensive, for all my indoor and outdoor audio – they sound great and have lasted me forever, so I said to myself: why not buy a soundbar made by a speaker company and not a TV company – makes perfect sense, no?
Thus, I chose these – the Polk Audio Signa S4:
Pros
– They have a total 7 drivers (physical speakers), and it is a 3.2.1 setup: 3 front channels (left, right and center), then 2 up facing left and right channels and a low frequency sub-woofer channel– now that is a SOUNDbar
- You can customize the voice and woofer, the rest is via presets – music, movie or nighttime
- It’s longer than most soundbars here, just over 41 inches (which may also be a con for some of you?)
- It paired with my phone via Bluetooth seamlessly (it appears most speakers in this price range do that)
- It came with everything, including a HDMI eARC cable, which is the required hookup for Dolby sound from say your Blu-ray player
- Big deal for me – when hooked up with the eARC, the sound bar goes both off/on with the TV, and you increase/decrease the sound with your master TV remote – NICE!
- Very easy to hookup – it was playing before I got back around to the front of the TV after I plugged in the soundbar and moved the TV table back in place – and the sub-woofer synced
- It sounds very nice and full – you can pull out the voice too, if need be, via 3 setting on the remote
Cons
- This soundbar, and most other in this price range, has no front display – which I think is a real shame – it has a series of 4 front facing lights, that respond in an order, and color, based up what you press on the remote – yuck – looks cheap after spending 3 bills on it
- What, no sports preset . . . isn’t that what most dudes buy a soundbar for, to go with their 2000 inch TV, for when they primarily use it to watch sports – how will hear what Rodgers says to his receivers when they run the wrong route?
– thus, I have to gig you one star for those two somewhat important personal cons
Based upon my requirements for a SOUNDbar, the max price I wanted to pay, and being able to live with the two personal cons for me, I am very happy with the S4, and plan to keep it/not send it back to the great and wonderful ZON
Hope this helps someone else shopping for a new soundbar with the same requirements
Note: I just bought this a week-ish ago, on 1/30-ish/23, and it was under 3 bills, but is now over that by $29/just under 10% - ??? - don't most items here go down over time - if it was that price when I was looking to replace my first purchase, I would have never even looked at it, since my requirement was that I wanted to only pay 3 bills max (plus of course the damn state sales tax!)
After reading various reviews of systems at higher price points that offered more features that I wouldn't use (Bluetooth, multiple speakers etc.) I decided to purchase this. Shipping was fine & timely, set up was also thank fully easy took less than 10 mins.
After playing around with the settings on the Signa 2 remote for a bit I picked the settings I liked and used the Roku remote to run the TV after that. Changing setting on the Signa remote is very easy if you switch to a movie or music.
There are 3 settings for voice adjustments, I was surprised by how much difference there are between them. I watch a lot of anime and changing between the three really highlighted the difference. On the highest setting the voices are much clearer and more of the background sounds are suppressed.
Likewise the movie setting is very different & you will get a much better overall sound experience with it on when watching movies.
The only real problem is the sound control, while my Roku remote moves the sound volume up & down one number at a time the Signa S2 once it is connected overrides the Roku remote from an audio perspective and adjusts the volume up or down in increments of 3...odd but I have not found a way to change it after several months of use.
At lower volume levels its not so bad but going from 13/16/19 as your only choices in medium levels is annoying. And 22 is other than music always too loud and 10 is too low.
But other than the annoying sound controls the system works very well, much better than the built in speakers. I am listening to this in a 12x15 bedroom so a larger/smaller room may mean volume controls are more important.
As to the overall sound quality to me it is fine, I'm not as concerned when watching TV about sound quality like I would be with head phones for use in gaming or listening to music. If your just looking to enhance the sound quality of your TV coupled with ease of set up & use at a fairly low price point I think you'd be pretty happy with this system.
At first I was getting irritated finding a volume that was between waking up everyone in house and not being able to hear conversations in tv shows. The remote volume button increased by 3 with just a touch of the volume it made me upset because the middle was the perfect setting. I ended up holding down the volume up button and the mute button for like 10 seconds and then tried holding down vol up and down at same time for ten seconds. A combination of or one of the buttons I was long pressing fixed the volume so it only goes up one increment at a time and adjusting placement of the soundbar and the subwoofer thing I bought 4 different kinds of soundbars when one came with damaged shipping box and blown crackling speakers, 2 out of the four speakers made messed up noises. I almost went with Samsung but they are always over priced for the same equipment as cheap model, at least they do that with their Chromebooks. Their phones, even caught not spending money for the security updates we have to install every month, and instead of security updates it was basically a program that changed icon shapes and small things like that to show it did work, only releasing the real security updates at the end of the entire year. Everyone with a Samsung phone and all 600 pre-installed apps at risk of security breach and identity theft unknowingly, my Google phone came with 70 pre-installed apps needed for phone function and works better, faster, clearer and stays connected to bluetooths without constant error notices inability to stay connected long enough to complete a task, I make great video calls and my Samsung Note 10+ dropped every call ever made with wifi calling turned on, constant breaches due to an enormous amount of junk apps and the very many unnecessary platforms that come in Samsung note and galaxy phones, their are always 3rd parties recieving information from texts and media messages, running Samsung, Google, outlook, Microsoft, Bixby, Google assistant, yahoo, free itunes account 6mnths free music, Alexa, Cortana. Internet browsers came with chrome, Google, Samsung, Microsoft, had to download Firefox too. Had to have a Samsung account ending with a outlook email addy, also need to share a Google account to Samsung and combine saved info, everything gets put all over the place photos and documents show up in 4 or 5 different places being saved in your phone to , Google drive, Google photos, Samsung photo gallery, internally in Samsung folders, onedrive, and downloads, Verizon(if u have), Adobe Acrobat pdf reader, Adobe cloud, my files app.
So anyway after 4 other soundbars large and bulky, one without the subwoofer for bass that just rattled the bar speakers, and one that wasn't easy to set up and too bulky and none of them have as good sound quality as Dolby digital, I bought a better optical cable which is the only connection to the tv. I didn't use HDMI cable or optical cable they send because if it wasn't twisted or fit in just right the sound would go in and out and make that white noise or popping sound. It wasn't really bad just could have used the HDMI cable they sent but for some reason I had hard time I had an optical cable I bought for a printer/fax/scanner I bought I never knew what it was for...
It's so so nice to hear my tv with a front facing speaker!!! I can actually hear the TV all the words without blasting it so all the sound facing back behind the TV no one in front of tv can hear it well and everyone in other side of tv can't hear anything other than the tv... I thought my hearing was going bad for a while. My ex was yelling at her dad his tvs back faces the hall of apartment complex. That's when I noticed that the new TV's being made have back speakers impossible to hear without it being too loud in the back. Tried cardboard and foam to block sound and bounce back to me. No more of that now.
My Polk signa Dolby soundbar is clear and great quality I find the sweet spot being in the voice adjust buttons low voice is 1, loudest voice adjust setting is 3. Voice adjust 2 is my favorite setting with bass turned down just a few and volume turned up 2 notches. My other favorite is the night mode turned up volume just a little. I can finally understand more than gunfire and explosions and crashes now I can hear what they are saying on the tv too. I love how slim this soundbar is, not as easy to damage doesn't block my remote sensor on bottom of tv, can wall mount without worry of it being too heavy or big. If you find yourself having to make adjustments to volume more than you would prefer to have to do, then consider moving your soundbar and separate bass system to different loctions. Maybe set in front of tv should be changed to mounted on wall just above tv and bass somewhere close to the tv my bass is set to the side but kind of behind the TV on the tv stand and I mounted mine just above the tv far enough the remote reaches it from my sitting angles and it's been way better than when I put it in front of tv. Great sound quality from the small soundbar shocked me enough to want to buy one for my father. Luckily it was on sale because I do think that 250 bucks is too much for this system. Especially the quality of the subwoofer sure it adds a bit of needed bass but only low low level because this subwoofer just makes everything muffled, at the right setting with volume it does a good job making your tv viewing a happy time with good clear sound. Any speakers with Dolby digital sound you can pretty much count on decent sound quality. It's not Bose but for the price I feel it's just as good. I have strange issues though, years of work has made it hard for me to hear anyone speaking to me if I can't clearly see them, it's like I have to be close enough to read their lips to hear them clearly. If I am not close enough to see the words their mouths form it just sounds like everyone is mumbling nonsense and made up words all day, but at the same time I suffer from sensory issues that have to do with sound and their pitch or frequency and what the sound is. Electric outlets plugs phone chargers light bulbs I can hear them all running. High pitch frequency both my parents could not hear my little sister couldn't hear it and neither could my older sister, to me it was like the highest piercing noise that ignited an immediate emotional reaction of pure hate and rage that noise made me want to dig my brain out through my ears. It was coming from a clothes dryer that had a problem with the belt or gears that spin it. I almost was put on psych hold after the rage hit again and I shoved the dryer on its back and started beating it while screaming at my mother for running it while I was home. My little stunt brought that high pitch squeeling down and now everyone but my dad could hear it. Thank goodness mom knows I'm bipolar but this experience wass new to me. And different noises have different responses that I can't control. A buzzing street light across the street and down the road to the 4th house the street lamp on the corner was new looking like an LED lamp. I could hear it in my house 5 bedroom 2 bath 3 story home I could hear the buzzing from that street light that sound caused and anxiety and serious need to find what's making that noise and stop it. I thought it was the hornets I didn't see any nests yet so I figured they got in the walls that year and had my ear against every wall looking for a warm buzzing area In the walls. Then at 3a.m. in gross pajamas and socks no shoes I wandered around my house down to the pond at the park up on my neighbors porch inspecting the pool filters that were running thinking that could be it it took me 2 hours of searching for this buzzing that seems to be coming from everywhere. Until finally I realized 4 new street lamps were looking like energy saving LEDs or something and only one was buzzing like that so far away no one believes me that I could hear it in my room watching TV windows doors storage and all the house in between me and that light. I'm on 3rd floor up high with the street lamps I think that's why I could hear it like it was in my walls. Once I got outside the noise was coming from above me and I could hear it so clearly from so far away it took me forever to find the source of this anxiety inducing noise I couldn't turn off. Causing such anxiety no other thoughts but making it stop could come into mind, going around the neighbors homes yards porches pools round and around staring up at the sky at 3a.m.
Finally I smartened up bought noise cancelling headphones!!! Anyway I love the different adjustments to the volume that can be made with six different modes and can move the bass and volume as you need to adjust. I switch between voice adjust 2, and night mode lower the bass. I'm very happy with this purchase just maybe spend a few bucks in a really good cable to connect it because even though they included multiple ways to connect this soundbar, a better quality optical cable and a proper HDMI enhanced audio or whatever I went with a 10 dollar optical
Optical Audio Cable 10ft/3M, iVANKY Slim Braided Fiber Audio Cable, Digital Optic Cord,Toslink Cable, Aluminum Shell, Gold-Plated for Sound Bar, TV, PS4, Xbox, Samsung, Vizio - CL3 Rated
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I bought this to replace the 12 year old $30 soundbar I had outside at my tiki bar that finally gave up the ghost. I have a corrugated tin roof which made it virtually impossible to hear anything when it's raining (a frequent dinner time occurrence here in FL). I was looking for volume because of this. It is louder than the last one, but not quite loud enough to overpower the rain when watching a movie, but when streaming Pandora or IHeart, it has more than enough power. If using in a "normal" ambient noise environment, it will be more than loud enough.
The sub is a nice addition and does add a nice dimension to the sound, but tends to be a bit muddy. I have it in a cabinet under my flat top grill and with the bass turned down it is pretty decent, adding just enough bass without overpowering the sound of the main speaker.
For my application (which admittedly is probably uncommon) it works well enough. I can see this being a decent option for someone on a budget that just wants a little more sound quality than what their tv can provide
Update: I have since moved the sub from the cabinet to a shelf up in the rafters near the main sound bar. Again, it's not optimal, but it's out of the elements, and the bass response is actually quite good up there. I have come upon a small issue, and it's no slight to the speaker as my application is not really what it was designed for, but when the humidity gets high (80% or more), it won't turn on. Once the humidity drops it functions normally.
The good:
1. Plug it in to HDMI-CEC on TV, plug in the subwoofer, easy set up.
2. It really does trick you at times that you have a full surround sound system. There were a few times during testing where I actually felt like I had rear speakers even with vaulted ceilings. Disclaimer my ceiling is only about 20 feet at peak.
3. Low profile so it fits in front of the TV without obstructing the bottom portion of the TV.
4. Worked immediately with my Fire TV.
5. For a sound bar system it really does deliver decent sound but see below.
6. Bass 5/10. The sub woofer is wireless so it is what it is.
The bad:
1: I mostly view video with Fire TV using apps Youtube TV, HBO Max, Netflix. I often have to pick up the remote to change between movie mode and night mode and also change voice modes to hear voices clearly. I wanted a more hands off approach.
2: There needs to be an optional setting to turn off the LED light after say 1 minute. The main light shows what the audio source is. That is nice to know but after a minute of no change in audio it should turn off. This is a minor complaint but it is a little distracting having the light right at the base of the TV
3. The volume goes up in strange increments. My TV shows the volume level of the sound bar and the volume goes up sometimes one increment and sometimes two. There are times when I prefer say a small increase but the volume goes up by two when instead I’d prefer the setting in the middle. For example say I want level 19 instead it goes from 18 to 20. And 20 is louder than I want.
4. This last one is petty. But the remote looks bulky and dated. Like something from 2 decades ago. Not a big deal. I’d usually stash it in a drawer but unfortunately I often need it as mentioned above.
In summary. This is a decent sound bar. The sound can trick you at times and make you feel like you have a full surround experience. However it isn’t very hands off. You may find yourself often picking up that aged looking remote to cycle through modes. It’s a good sound bar overall but Polk could expand the user experience by updating the software to allow for the LED status light to be turned off and fixing the volume adjustment increment issue. Of course this would also require manually downloading the update to a USB drive because there is no Wifi connection.
Polk took 15 min and several failed attempts at set up. It was much more work and steps to get it working. If you buy the Polk you will see what I mean.
2. Polk doesn't have as many functions available on the remote as Vizio does.
Eg. Vizio has separate bass and sub adjustments and a cool indicator light on sound bar Polk does not. That feature is key to dialing in the sound.
3.vizio has a treble adjustment on remote Polk doesn't have a treble adjustment.
4. Vizio talks to you giving instructions resulting in a really fast set up. Just push power button on sub and a couple quick steps and voila its done.
5.vizio looks higher class in my opinion the sub is real slick looking with all rounded molded in back with the sides. It looks higher end than polkas particle board square look like most of the subs iv seen. The Vizio is half the size and sounds twice as big with much lower and powerful bass.
Well there are some facts and opinions.
Hands down in every way I could see and hear the Vizio was the one that I would choose.
I hooked them up in the same room exactly in the same spot and played the same movie Vizio sound much better in every way with killer bass.
And Vizio had a nicer more sleek remote control.
The Vizio also has the woofer pointing towards the ground and also has a port in the back of the sub box so you can put it in the corner and the port will face toward the wall creating a deep bass.
Polk speaker is inside box with just a port facing to the front so if you face the port towards the wall you end up seeing the ugly back of the Polk woofer.
So there you have it lots of facts and opinions.
Now, onto the setup aspect of this system. The speaker comes with just a quick setup guide for getting started, the remote, an HDMI cable AND an optical digital cable, as well as a template for doing the wall mount. I didn't really need the template because all you have to do is measure the distance from the holes in the back of the speaker and make sure they're level when marking on the wall. But I'm glad it's also included. At first I didn't use the HDMI cable connection, just the digital optical and in doing that, I wasn't getting any sound from from my TV. So after connecting the recommended HDMI input to the speaker, was I able to get the sound as well from my TV. The best thing about this is that I'm able to use my TV remote to raise and lower the volume and see the level on screen, I enjoyed that detail. So it just works like a charm, and once the HDMI input is connected, all the channels on my Roku TV output sound through the speaker. So, this is a pretty easy speaker to setup, since the sub is also paired to the bar and I personally didn't have to do anything to get the sub working with the speaker. Just plug both into the outlet and you're done. The only little nit to pick with this speaker is the fact that once it's connected to my TV, it always comes on when I turn on the TV, which is something I'd rather not have happen. Problem is that if I turn off the speaker while just watching through the TV's speakers, after turning the TV off, the speaker will turn itself back on using the current through the HDMI cable. Of course all you have to do is shut the speaker off again, but it's a little annoying. And of course, you can just unplug the cable from the HDMI input if you don't want the speaker to come on with the TV.
But in all actuality, I'm very happy with this speaker setup and I can't believe how nice it sounds for the price. Of course, there are better options out there, but this will get the job done for 95% of the people who buy it, and you can't go wrong with that. I recommend this to anyone who needs something simple, attractive, easy to use and set up, with good sound for movies and music. I'm only taking one star away just for the fact that I wish it would stay off until I turn it on myself and not when switching on the TV. My honest rating would be 4.5 stars, I love this thing!
Fast-forward to now; our bedroom bar started acting up so I decided to buy a new one. I figured since our current six year old 2.1ch Visio bar sounded great I'd get similar results from this Polk 2.1ch system; I was wrong.
The Visio has always impressed me in that with only the 2 channels I often felt like sounds were coming from points in the room far beyond the bar, making me think we had additional speakers. I have no idea how it did this, but I felt like the sounds and vocals were clear, crisp, and vibrant, with a wide sound stage. Bass was equally full, deep, and rich; everything just sounded good, at any volume level.
While the Polk bar has excellent bass which fills the room and sounds equally rich, it lacks clarity on the high-end frequencies and sounds muddy. Voices sound somewhat 'tin can'-ish. There is very little noticeable channel separation and everything sounds rather blah; you can't hear much detail.
The remote does have a number of different preset audio settings, including 3 different voice-enhancement modes, but none of them really make the bar sound good. There's no treble adjustment at all. While the voice enhancement settings do help bring out the vocal track, it still has an un-natural sound quality to it. It's especially bad at lower volume levels. While the bar brings a good bit of power and fullness to the lower-end bass, the mids and highs are about as bad as our TVs built-in speakers.
The sound is slightly better if you're sitting very close to the TV, but gets much worse if you're farther away. Our bedroom is fairly large and it just does not sound good in that room. It may be acceptable at best in a smaller room.
The good things about it are HDMI connectivity with CEC control, so the TV controls the sound bar perfectly. Bar is easy to mount and includes all cables, although power cords are very short.
We are likely going to return this one and get something more expensive in hopes of getting one that sounds as good or better than what we had. My parents have the Samsung 5.1ch sound bar and it sound amazing, so that might be a good option, but is twice the price. I'm willing to pay more for good sound.
Bottom line for me is that I wouldn't recommend this one. Although Polk is a solid, trusted brand, this particular product just doesn't live up to the name.
Update 2/5/2021
We decided to keep the sound bar, but moved it to our smaller flex room, which has hardwood floors. In that room the sound bar actually doesn't sound half bad due to the acoustics of the space and that the room is so much smaller.
For our master we ended up buying the Samsung HWQ60T 51ch Soundbar with 3D Surround Sound and Acoustic Beam 2020 Black. This system blows the Polk away but of course it's three times the price. It is much better suited for the larger room. The Samsung also has that vibrant, detailed, and expansive sound we were looking for.
I'm upgrading my rating from 3 to 4 stars because the Polk sound bar, when used in a smaller space, sounds quite given the price point. I wouldn't recommend it for larger rooms.
It synced to the Vizio on fist try. Took a few minutes to figure out the remote. I use it of course for TV, but I use it a lot for playing music.
The sound is better than I imagined. It has more volume than I’ll ever use, and great clarity. It comes with wireless bass which worked perfectly the moment I plugged it in. The only ‘con’ is that there’s not a volume level for the bass. You have to adjust according to your taste. It doesn’t put out ground vibrating bass, but is solid.
I recommend this product. Great value and perfect for what I want.
Update: I realized that the sound bar wasn't perfectly aligned with my TV speakers and there was a significant delay or echo in the sound. My TV is about 6 years old, and that is probably the issue. There is no fix in the audio menu of the TV. The solution I landed on was to use an Aux cable instead of the Optical/HDMI combo. That solved my delay issue and I don't really notice much of a difference in the sound quality. Still very happy with the product.