Audio News

Engineers try to expand the borders of acoustics with technical tricks and conjure up more volume in less room. Sony is also starting one such attempt and has now developed speakers that should be able to unlock cinema quality sound from tiny cubes – with a lot of support from the bass.

They are so small and completely inconspicuous in the living room, yet they should be able to create a sound stage on par with the greatest of sound systems: Each of the five speakers is only the size of a golf ball, from which Sony’s engineers have formed a surround sound speaker system that should be able to take on much larger systems in terms of sound. Company spokesman Eiko Sato is not revealing how they managed such a feat and is keeping the information secret.

Of course, the trick behind having the large sound emit from tiny speakers cannot be completely covered up either. Especially because the home theatre system’s authority usually depends massively on the other box with which the tiny cubes are delivered. The accompanying box is everything other than miniscule with a height of 43 centimetres and harbours 6 amplifiers with a total of 450 Watts, not to mention the subwoofer. It’s this box’s job to fatten up the somewhat thing sound coming from the golf ball satellites.

The bass box also serves to give the buyer a better feeling of satisfaction after carrying it out of the electronics shop. Because if their size and weight is taken as any indication (43 x 43 millimetres and 70 grams), then the boxes could definitely not be said to be cheap. Its then up to the massive subwoofer to justify the equally massive price tag of 90,000 Yen, around £440, for HT-IS100 set.

The subwoofer serves foremost as the nerve centre for the speaker system. It’s completely compatible with modern entertainment devices, offers three HDMI ports, and connection possibilities for DVD players, Blu-ray players and gaming consoles. It has already been determined that the speaker combination will also be available in Europe and America. The only question is when and Sony has yet to reveal this information to us.

Sony’s executives also seen to be fully aware that they are going against the general trend with their new surround sound system. Most new presentations in the surround sound department are trying to achieve full-bodied surround sound using acoustic tricks and only three to four speakers. The advantage thereof: One does not need to install any cables and the entire system can be kept under or next to the TV device. However, how close such special speakers actually come to producing a real surround sound effect remains debatable. Sony has their own way of putting any questions to rest. Simply compare two systems, one being the HT-IS100 and the other being the similarly constructed HT-CT100, just without any satellite speakers. With the HT-CT100, instead of many satellite speakers, only one flat sound performance produces the acoustic noise, making a true “surround” sound slightly less achievable. Of course, it is also supported with a powerful subwoofer. Because one thing seems clear to Sony’s engineers regardless which speaker system they are working on: there is no replacement for high volume.