Maxell MXSB 252 Digital SoundBase TV Speaker

Having recently moved to a larger house, we upgraded to a larger TV also (Philips 39" LED, bought from Richer Sounds).Whilst the sound quality is adequate, we decided to invest in a budget sound bar seeking greater clarity and depth.I spent many days researching the options on this and other sites and eventually settled for the Maxell which does not appear to be widely available. I could find no English reviews of this sound bar and finally considered Google translations of a number of German websites. Whilst the translations were a little hit and miss, nevertheless the reviews were all positive.The features that attracted me to the Maxell are:1. I liked the design and the fact that the TV sits on top of the sound bar. (4 soft rubber cushions are supplied which you fix on top of the sound bar to reduce any possible vibration). Whilst there are similar cheaper options available, they did not appear to be as robust nor have as wide a range of connection options.2. Both the TV and sound bar are ARC compatible so that they can be connected by a single HDMI cable. (I bought the Amazon Basics high speed cable which is also ARC compatible). None of the other budget sound bars have this capability which I particularly wanted - the prevailing view appears to be that HDMI connection gives the best quality sound. It also means that you can control volume from the TV remote and only need to use the sound bar remote to select from the various options.3. It was within budget at £120.4. It has many connection options, in the event that I ever decide to get into gaming etc.The Maxell has limited scope for fine tuning the sound which may put some people off but I suspect this applies to most cheaper products.As to the actual experience, well the service from Smartgear was excellent - it arrived within 48 hours rather than the advertised 5 to 7 days. It was easy to set up. It certainly enhances the sound - the tinny reproduction of the TV speakers is already a distant memory - and the surround sound setting does introduce a cinematic quality, albeit not on the scale of top of the range sound systems.All in all, highly recommended.UPDATE December 2013Having been very happy with the 252, a couple of months ago it stopped delivering any sound! My tv pop-up indicated that the sound bar was active, and the sound bar responded to instructions from the remote but was silent. I checked all the connections and tried rebooting it without success.So I contacted the retailer (Smartgear) via Amazon's website. Smartgear responded by phone within a couple minutes of my e-mail and after discussion decided to put me in direct contact with Maxell and to monitor progress. Maxell made a number of suggestions, none of which worked so it was agreed that my unit was faulty. They asked me to return the unit direct to them for checking, and assuming the fault was confirmed, would offer either a refund or replacement.Eventually, the unit was confirmed as faulty. Rather than a direct replacement, Maxell have agreed that I can upgrade to their new 3000 sound bar (paying the difference in cost). I would happily have accepted a direct replacement for the 252 had the new model not been available but am attracted to the 3000 model because of its bluetooth connectivity but mainly because of its enhanced power. i expect to receive the 3000 shortly.Obviously, this course of events was disappointing but I do feel that I was just unlucky. The procedure leading up to the eventual replacement was a little slow (partly down to me) but throughout both Smartgear and Maxell were clearly doing their best to resolve the problem to my satisfaction. I will review the 3000 once I have had an opportunity to test it.

It's important to note that the effectiveness of this soundbase will very much depend on the devices you connect to it, the type of TV you have and the way you connect it as a result, so you may need patience and persistence to get the best out of it.I mainly watch Sky TV (occasionally DVD) on a Samsung tv with only one HDMI slot. My main purpose for purchase is that struggle to hear dialogue on several tv shows due to the poor speakers in my TV.1. The instructions suggest arc is the best method of connection but I don't have it.2. It's suggested that the next best is HDMI; connecting my sky and dvd players to the soundbar, then another hdmi from soundbar to TV. One advantage of this is that the soundbar allowed me to use several HDMI devices when I was previously restriced to one. Note that the tv picture doesn't passthrough when the soundbar is turned off so this wiring method commits you to using it fulltime. With this set up I found the sound enhanced and didn't realise what dramatic soundtracks some TV shows had, but it didn't make any improvement to the shows with muffled dialogue - if anything amplifying the other sounds to magnify the problem. At this point I became disappointed at the limited ability to fine tune the soundbar. I tried the advice in other reviews by using TV and soundbar sound together but they were slightly out of sync making it sound echoey.3. Next I tried using the supplied RCA cable (satellite to TV by HDMI then RCA from TV to soundbase) hoping that I could use my tv graphic equilisers or the "speech" mode on the TV but these adjustments were not passed to the soundbar so it made no difference. I had also lost the hdmi switching by using this method.4. I then purchased an optical cable and chose to connect this from sky to soundbar (hdmi still sending pictures and sound from sky to tv) and was able to use a setting on the sky box to delay sound by 60ms which overcame the earlier sync problems. With this wiring I get enhanced sound effects through the soundbar and have the tv speakers on too in "speech" mode to try and enhance dialogue. This is the best setting for my circumstances though I would need to adjust the connections for DVD use.After a few weeks of using setting 4 sound is definitely enhanced -it seems that background music and effects are more prominent making some programs more cinematic - but given that its made no improvement to dialogue clarity and considering the limitations on fine tuning the sound settings, with hindsight I would not have purchased this product.Update - Nine months on and I've purchased a new soundbar. The heavy bass on the maxell was providing unrealistic sound while not helping with dialogue clarity. I now have a Yamaha YAS-93 which is much better.