We only know only one TV manufacturer currently including ‘negative’ audio delay on their TVs, and that’s TCL! Indeed they’ve told us they include it specifically because of delay problems with soundbars. The only problem at first start-up was sync – everything playing from the TV via ARC had the audio lagging badly, beyond our tolerance.This isn’t a bar which has built-in audio delay, and in any case, that would only make things work. We were confused at first by its volume controls: it has treble ‘+’ and ‘–’ keys, bass ‘+’ and ‘–’ keys, but not marked volume keys – instead these are the vertical keys of the centre circle buttons (the horizontal keys seem unallocated to any task). The TV remote controlled the volume, or we could use the TCL’s own remote. The subwoofer wirelessly paired automatically with the subwoofer the TV announced that a sound system was attached to it, and routed the sound there even without us making a selection. We plugged a 4K Blu-ray into the TCL bar’s HDMI input, and plugged the HDMI output into a Samsung TV with an (e)ARC socket. Its driver is a 133mm (5½-inch) cone which fires downwards, which makes positioning nicely flexible, with only the rear port to consider. The separate subwoofer is compact indeed – the size of a medium-sized bookshelf speaker, standing 35cm high with a 20cm square footprint. There are also a couple of holes which we’d take to be bass reflex ports firing forward, and five large LED character displays which provide information, unusually using serif-type ‘T’ rather than the sans-serif more common to such displays. (We’ve seen some bars, including from Samsung, where drivers fire straight up, which we think rather odd.)Īlong the front of the bar, and a little harder to illuminate with our torch, are three front LCR channels, the left and right each getting a 25mm tweeter and 90 × 48mm racetrack-shaped midrange driver, while the centre is unusual in having what looks like a circular dome within an oval driver, listed in the specs as 80 × 48mm. The bar has two, each around 7cm diameter, and by peering with a torch through the fabric warp on top we could see that they are angled forward, a sensible Atmos-enabled approach to bounce height information off the ceiling to the listening position. We used both in our tests, as well as running audio from the smart TV and connected devices.Īnd you do want to be giving it genuine Atmos, in order to make use of its upfiring drivers. The reliable way to give the bar Atmos soundtracks is to plug an Atmos-capable device physically into the bar – a 4K Blu-ray player or Apple TV 4K, for example. But as with any soundbar, we recommend a trial or advance advice as to how the ARC will operate with any particular TV, to avoid disappointment after installation. In short, we have every reason to think the TCL will play nice with TCL TVs, and it played nice with the two TVs we connected (Samsung and Toshiba). (MP3 files only), Chromecast, AirPlay 2, Bluetoothĭrivers: 2 × 25mm tweeters (L/R) 2 × 90 × 48mm midrange (L/R), 80 × 48mm (centre), 2 x ~70mm (up)ĪRC can, however, allow you to receive Dolby Atmos audio from streaming services such as Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video, as these services embed Dolby Atmos inside the lossy Dolby Digital Plus format which ARC can handle. Inputs: 1 × HDMI, HDMI ARC, optical, USB-A
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