Sound quality: In its Music sound mode Polk Audio's Signa s1 delivers sound quality that falls in the good range - it reproduces music and dialog reasonably well despite the obvious shortcomings in its sound. The bass has good impact, but is a bit boomy and deepest bass is lacking. The midrange is a bit thin, hazy, grainy, and etched. The treble is extended, but is sizzly and somewhat prominent. This model does a so-so job of recovering room ambience (the sense of the acoustic space in which the music was recorded), it also generally sounds a bit congested and lacks fine detail. In Movie mode the sound the bass gets a bit more prominent, the treble seems a bit less sizzly, and the sound field gets a bit wider and taller. The Voice adjust modes make the sound more and more harsh as the voice adjust level is increased. There was no significant difference in sound quality between the optical, analog, and Bluetooth inputs. The system can provide satisfying volume in a medium sized room.
TV setup and ease of use: Good overall. Setup: The system comes with an optical digital audio cable for TV connection, a stereo analog audio cable must be purchased separately if you want or need to connect your TV that way. Ease of Use: The soundbar's remote is uncluttered with controls that are well labeled. The its console has power, source, and volume controls that are well marked and are easy to see and access. Although there is no mute control, if the soundbar has been muted from the remote pressing one of the console volume buttons unmutes it. The display shows power status and has source indicators consists of unlabeled patterned or color coded lights that require the instructions to decode. There is an indication when the volume is changed, but the level is not shown. The mute status indication is highly visible, and there is a visual indication that a DSP (digital sound processing) mode has been selected but no indication of what the selection is.
Features setup and ease of use: Good overall. Setup: Pairing a Bluetooth device required a long push of a well marked button - easy and straight forward. Ease of Use: The remote is uncluttered and controls are well labeled. The soundbar console has power, source, and volume controls that are well marked and are easy to see and access. Although there is no mute control, if the soundbar has been muted from the remote pressing one of the console volume buttons unmutes it. The display shows power status and has source indicators consists of unlabeled patterns of color coded lights that require the instructions to decode. There is an indication when the volume is changed, but the level is not shown. The mute status indication is highly visible, and there is a visual indication that a DSP mode has been selected but no indication of what the selection is. If you switch from the Bluetooth source to another source and then back again you have to manually re-connect the Bluetooth source device.
