Sound quality: Samsung's HW-R450 delivers sound quality that falls in the Good range - it reproduces music and dialog reasonably well despite the obvious shortcomings in its sound. In the Standard sound mode the bass has good impact, but is somewhat prominent and boomy, and the deepest bass is lacking. The midrange is fairly even, but is a touch constricted, slightly dark and grainy. The treble is fairly extended, but is slightly subdued, generally somewhat smeared, and the upper treble is a bit sizzly. This model does a decent job of recovering room ambience (the sense of the acoustic space in which the music was recorded), but it also sounds somewhat congested. With stereo program material sound field extends somewhat above, but not much beyond the width of the speaker array, and lacks front to back depth. The other Sound mode settings made the sound field somewhat wider and taller but also to varying degrees made the sound metallic, louder, echoey, and pushed more forward. In the Standard sound mode with multi-channel program material the sound image may extend well past the sides and above the soundbar, but still lacks depth. The other sound mode settings didn't significantly effect the sound field, but to varying degrees made the sound metallic, louder, echoey, and pushed more forward. There was no significant difference in sound quality between the optical, USB, Bluetooth, and analog inputs. The system can provide satisfying volume in a medium sized room.
TV setup and ease of use: Very Good overall. Setup: The soundbar can be controlled by TV remotes from Samsung and other major brands; activation and deactivation of this feature is quick and easy but not intuitive, so easy to follow instructions included with unit have to be referred to. The system comes with an optical digital audio cable for TV connection, a stereo analog cable must be purchased separately if you want or need it to connect your TV. Ease of Use: This model can work seamlessly with many TVs - it can be set to respond to the volume and mute commands of the remotes of many major brand TVs including Samsung. Its own physical remote is uncluttered and has well labeled controls. An app remote that operates via Bluetooth can also be downloaded on to Android mobile devices; we found the app to be easy to use and glitch-free. The soundbar console's power, source, and volume controls consist of raised symbols that are adequately sized but are black on a black background on the right side of the soundbar where they are not easy to see and may be hard to access. The console lacks a mute control, but if it is muted from the remote pressing one of the console volume buttons unmutes it. All display information can momentary be seen from a typical listening position; the source and, when activated, mute displays are persistent but dim after a while and then may be hard to see at farther than arms length, but the source display brightens momentarily without changing and can be seen from farther away whenever a control is actuated. The display shows the numeric volume level, and the chosen DSP effects mode when those controls are used as well as the power on/off status when the soundbar is first turned on or off.
Features setup and ease of use: Good overall. Setup: Bluetooth pairing is very easy - if no Bluetooth device has previously been paired or the paired device does not have Bluetooth activated the unit is automatically in pairing mode once the remote's dedicated Bluetooth pairing button has been pressed. An Android mobile device Bluetooth remote app is available for use with this soundbar; the app download instructions are provided on-line but not with unit; the instructions with unit refer to the on-line instructions. Ease of Use: The HW-R450's physical remote is uncluttered and controls are well labeled. An app remote that operates via Bluetooth can be downloaded on to Android mobile devices. We found it to be easy to use and glitch-free. The soundbar console's power, source, and volume controls consist of raised symbols that are adequately sized but are black on a black background on the right side of the soundbar where they are not easy to see and may be hard to access. The console lacks a mute control, but if it is muted from the remote pressing one of the console volume buttons unmutes it. All display information can momentary be seen from a typical listening position; the source and, when activated, mute displays are persistent but dim after a while and then may be hard to see from farther than arms length, but the source display brightens momentarily without changing and can be seen from farther away whenever a control is actuated. The display shows the numeric volume level, and the chosen DSP effects mode when those controls are used as well as the power on/off status when the soundbar is first turned on or off. If you switch from the Bluetooth source to another source and then back again you have to manually re-connect the Bluetooth source device.
