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Price comparison:
Philips HTS6510
More info: Philips
Size (WxHxD): Player - 340x70x330mm, Sat - 305x122x96mm, Sub - 557x414x526mm
Weight: Player - 3.5kg, Sat - 2kg, Sub - 7kg
Power rating: 500W
Disc formats: CD, DVD, CD-R, SVCD, CD-RW, DVD+R, DVD-R, DVD+RW, DVD-RW, MP-3 CD, Picture CD, Video CD/SVCD, DivX, MPEG 1, 2, 4, JPEG, WMA
Video connections: HDMI output, component out, Scart, S-Video out, composite out
Decoding: Dolby Digital, DTS, Dolby Pro Logic II
Tuner: AM/FM
Upscaling: 1080i
Plus points:
Looks good, effective tilt at cut-price surround sound
Minus points:
Sound suffers compared to 5.1 system, weak and unfocused bass
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Everyone loves the idea of virtual surround. Don't they? No need for all those messy cables and intrusive speakers. No need for complicated set-up procedures and awkward placements. But getting a virtual surround system to behave as it should in theory and deliver the sonic goods as well as a traditional 5.1 system - now that's a different story.
So it is with Philips' three-speaker (two satellites, one subwoofer) system. It's certainly a slick-looking unit, with matching piano black surrounds for the satellites and top of the DVD player, with additional grey panelling on player, sub and speaker stands.
The satellites come with their own integrated table-top stands, as well as their own integrated cables (3m, though there's no real option to change them).
There's no rattly disc tray since it's a slot-loading device and all the playback controls are mounted on the front of the player, including an eye-catching volume wheel, but the contrastingly white remote is a decent-looking and well-built item.
It can handle most varieties of standard and compressed resolution CD and DVD formats, as well as MP3, JPEG, and DivX files, plus there's a USB port and a phono socket for connection to MP3 players and flash drives on on the front panel
Initial set-up is easy - just connect the sats and sub to the player using the supplied leads, connect to your screen via Scart (also supplied), HDMI, composite, component or S-video cables (not supplied) and you're ready to go. Unfortunately, there are no video inputs, so there's no daisy-chaining of other sources such as digibox or games console - you'll need to connect them directly to your TV, and switch sources via your screen.
There isn't much scope for sound adjustment either and besides physically moving the speakers around you're pretty much limited to four preset sound options: Concert, Drama, Action and Sci-Fi. For the record, the Concert setting sounded echoey, and there didn't appear to be a great deal of difference between the other three.
Sound quality
While there's a lot to be said for the concept of virtual surround, the sonic reality all too often falls short of the ideal. For one thing you've generally got to be very careful with speaker placement (always an issue of course, but while in theory it's meant to make speaker placement easier, that's rarely the case). The SonoWave speakers took a lot of placing before we got anything approaching an acceptable sound.
Following the instruction manual's suggested placement on either side of the screen initially left us feeling short-changed. The sound was tinny and uninvolving, and the surround effect sounded echoey and confusing. Moving the speakers closer to our listening position helped, as did shifting the subwoofer away from the screen and closer to our sofa.
That's when we started to appreciate the system. With blockbuster action flick soundtracks like Mission Impossible 3 there's a decent spread of sound, and it certainly widens the audio stage beyond what you'd expect from stereo, though there's not a great deal in the way of precision. Sounds would occasionally seem to appear from way off to one side, but the effect didn't appear to be consistent. Dialogue was clear enough though and generally accurately placed, despite there being no centre speaker.
For DVD playback, discs benefited from upconversion to 1080i and pictures appeared crisp and detailed. The bass however is weak in two ways. For one it doesn't carry much presence, which could be a matter of volume, but since there's no way to adjust it in the mix, it feels a bit neglected.
Still, you can always place it nearer your listening position if you want to beef up the low end a bit. But if you do, you end up exposing the sub's weaknesses - it's woolly and undefined where it should be crisp and tight, especially on music playback like in Elvis Costello and Allen Toussaint's concert DVD Hot As A Pistol, Keen As A Blade.
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The HTS6510 is designed with small rooms in mind and for people who put aesthetics and space limitations above overall sound quality. It will certainly add a certain grace to any room, but it flounders in larger spaces and won't take the place of a proper surround system in the average UK living room. For a bedroom or a bedsit it's a handy upgrade though, especially at this price, though it will be interesting to hear how it compares with Philips' upcoming one-speaker version (plus sub), due later this year.
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