Samsung - HW-Q900A

UK based here - I bought the 990f from amazon a few months ago when it dropped to £799 and for that price its a really good buy - not sure it's good value at over £1000 though. I have a 4 year old Samsung 900A in my bedroom with the 950 rears - and I am still constantly impressed by it - bought with a cashback deal for around £500 in the good old days. I have a LGSN11RG in another room I picked up used for around £400 about 4 years ago - I've struggled with the LG - but am happy with it now - again for the price paid I'm not complaining. I am disabled and can spend days - sometimes weeks confined to bed - so I enjoy having a nice picture sound in vatious rooms around the house - and the rooms don't allow for a dedicated atmos amp etc - in my opinion it's all about performance and value. If the 990F Drops in price again - then I would absolutely consider it. I personally have no problem with the sub.

Absolutely worth it! I have the Samsung hw-q900a in my living room. Absolutely love it.

Best of the best would be q990c or d BUT if you want a very solid one for MUCH cheaper, you can look into its older iteration or the 900x series. Q990c/d are 1000-1500$ sound system. Their price is quite inflated because the biggest improvement they have over previous gen is some features like auto EQ, nightmode, Alexa built in etc… but not much purely sound wise. I personally got the Q900A + 2x SWA9500S rear speaker for 320$. The sound difference is minimal. If the q990d is a 20/20, the q990c is a 19,5/20 and my q900a is a 18,5/20. And its 70% cheaper lol The Q950T can also be a great choice if you have good deals since it is from 2020. Lacks some features the others have but it’s probably top 5 Samsung in terms of sound quality. Very good one!

Using the rears as fronts, vastly improves music quality. But if u only want a standalone, maybe look to sonos arc ultra, if thats too much the q900 would be great as well, even the q800.

Yeah Samsung q800 or q900 series are both stellar for dialogue. I hated the older Samsungs for dialogue, but anything b, c, d or newer in those ranges are awesome with dialogue, even when you don’t turn on the voice enhancement. My q990b is fantastic for voice clarity even in action movies at any volume.

I’ve got a 5.1 jamo setup, and the HomePods are not even comparable, and a centre channel does make things better, but a good set of bookshelves handle dialogue well enough I don’t miss a centre channel at all. We watch a lot of TV, movies and TV shows, so I don’t know what to tell you. We bought the jamo gear because our 7.1.2 Samsung soundbar sucked hardcore with dialogue, and I constantly had to change sound modes to attempt to hear things. Not worth the bookshelf speakers though. IMO the HomePods are worse than the TV speakers sometimes. Also planar tweeters were a big upgrade for me for dialogue.

Typically yes there should be a difference. More channels means more sound separation. However it may not be as noticeable in a soundbar system compared to an actual surround sound home theater system. I would suggest just making sure whatever system you go with comes with satellite speakers to truly experience the difference. I originally purchased a Samsung 7.1.2 system that did not have satellite speakers. However I purchased the add-on satellite speakers that Samsung sells separately which converts my system to a 9.1.4. The satellite speakers is what made the difference. More channels=better/more sound separation.

Get the Sonos system. Samsung is terrible at support. Further you can buy the Sonos components from Costco. At least most of them. Return policy is quite generous as you probably know. Don’t be tempted by the Samsung pricing. It’s just not as good or reliable as the Sonos systems. He’ll even the JBL soundbar systems have better sound than the Q series.