Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar - White

The Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar is an incredible addition to any home theater setup. Bose is synonymous with quality sound equipment. I own their Noise cancelling headphones, Bluetooth speakers, and a portable PA system, and all of them are the best products in their category in my opinion. So, it was no surprise to me that when I got the new Ultra Soundbar in my home it blew away my previous tv speaker setup by leaps and bounds. But let’s dive into the meats and potatoes of what makes this soundbar so good.Initial unboxing and setup were very simple and straightforward. The speaker comes in a classy glossy black finish, its downright sexy if I’m being honest. The speaker is lightweight for its size and fit perfectly on my mantle under the tv in our Living room. ... MoreThe Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar is an incredible addition to any home theater setup. Bose is synonymous with quality sound equipment. I own their Noise cancelling headphones, Bluetooth speakers, and a portable PA system, and all of them are the best products in their category in my opinion. So, it was no surprise to me that when I got the new Ultra Soundbar in my home it blew away my previous tv speaker setup by leaps and bounds. But let’s dive into the meats and potatoes of what makes this soundbar so good.Initial unboxing and setup were very simple and straightforward. The speaker comes in a classy glossy black finish, its downright sexy if I’m being honest. The speaker is lightweight for its size and fit perfectly on my mantle under the tv in our Living room. Provided with the speaker was a high-speed HDMI ethernet cable, a remote, a power cable and a weird looking headset which I’ll get to in a bit. Setting up the speaker itself I took notice of the additional ports behind the speaker for an ethernet cable (but the speaker does have built in Wifi) and optical cable, an AdaptiQ port and a bass plug. Additionally, you can add wireless bass modules 500 and 700 along with the Bose Surround 700 speakers for a complete home theater system.Once everything was hooked up, I used the Bose app to get the speaker setup. It instantly found the speaker and did a software update and then had me do an AdaptiQ sound setup for my room using the headset provided. AdaptiQ considers how your speaker sounds depending on where you sit and adjusts settings accordingly. I found it to be an intuitive feature with the ability to tweak and adjust as needed. The Bose app is very impressive and compliments the speaker very well. It has a multitude of features at your disposal, you can completely control the volume, source, and adjust settings all from your phone. I was able to change the CEC option, so my speaker automatically turns on when I power up the TV. You can connect additional speakers, music services such as Pandora and Spotify, enable Chromecast streaming and Voice assistance through Alexa. Theres also a Voice4Video feature that is extremely impressive in that if you have a cable box attached to your tv you can change channels, HDMI inputs, play music and make phone calls all using voice commands. Being able to say things like Alexa “Watch NFL Network” and it changes on the fly is amazing! The app also has access to things like Local Radio and Podcasts which are sure to be a hit with my wife since she loves her Dateline podcasts and you can even save them as Presets. Another very cool feature is being able to connect your Noise Cancelling headphones or another portable speaker to the setup as well. Overall I was very impressed by all the features the App brings to the speaker itself.The most important part of a sound bar must be the overall quality of the sound, because let’s be honest what’s the point of a bunch of features if the sound isn’t great and this is where the Bose Ultra Sound Bar really excels. With nine total speakers inside this beautiful sound bar, it delivers a rich and immersive audio experience for any home theater or music fan. I am a huge music junkie so the first thing I did once setup was play some of my favorite tunes to see how it sounds and was amazed by how crisp and clear the music was. You would think not having a separate base module would make the sound muddy but that’s not the case at all. I was blown away by how loud the speaker could get as well. I can just envision myself for years to come playing music in our family room through this speaker and it fills my heart with joy. The experience watching movies is no different. There is an especially cool AI feature that they’ve added that detects when vocals are being played and it allows the speakers to separate those to make sure you don’t miss key dialogue in intense sounding scenes. We watched Avatar 2 Way of the Water as the first movie, and I was really impressed by the overall sound quality. For being just a single sound bar, it blew me away with how well it can act as a complete surround sound experience. I think if you paired this with the wireless bass module you would be hard pressed to find a better surround sound experience for the money. We came away very impressed by the movie quality sound and look forward to watching many more movies with this setup.Overall, I can’t recommend the Bose Smart Ultra Sound bar enough for someone looking for an all in one home theater experience. The speaker is synonymous with Bose quality products and is a home run in my opinion. The App experience only adds to the features it possesses. If you’re looking for a great sound bar for your home this is the one, Period.

Unboxing the Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar, I was shocked at how similar it looked to the Soundbar 900. The weight was impressive and the glasslike finish adds an elegant touch, though now I need to figure out how to fill the space in my cubby!Initial setup of the Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar was relatively straightforward. I encountered a minor setback when attempting to use the app on my iPhone running iOS 17, as it persistently crashed. Even with a few resets and updates the app still crashes upon startup to this day. This led me to use an iOS 16-equipped iPhone, which fortunately established a successful connection. Once connected the rest of the set-up process was easy to follow the on-screen instructions.The best feature of the Smart Ultra Soundbar is its ... MoreUnboxing the Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar, I was shocked at how similar it looked to the Soundbar 900. The weight was impressive and the glasslike finish adds an elegant touch, though now I need to figure out how to fill the space in my cubby!Initial setup of the Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar was relatively straightforward. I encountered a minor setback when attempting to use the app on my iPhone running iOS 17, as it persistently crashed. Even with a few resets and updates the app still crashes upon startup to this day. This led me to use an iOS 16-equipped iPhone, which fortunately established a successful connection. Once connected the rest of the set-up process was easy to follow the on-screen instructions.The best feature of the Smart Ultra Soundbar is its seamless compatibility with AirPlay 2, which means I can use in conjunction with all my Apple devices and speakers. The best part was the soundbar's natural assimilation into my existing HomeKit framework, bypassing the need for additional setup – it simply materialized my home's audio list. I literally have no wires running to the soundbar aside from the power cable and it works flawlessly with my AppleTV setup.When evaluating sound quality, the Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar consistently excels, particularly in the domain of dialogue articulation. Dialogue is crisp and decipherable, which is key in a room with lofted ceilings Furthermore, the sound stage made me feel like there was a wall of sound with multiple speakers. While not exactly the same as a dedicated surround sound system, it was quite impressive for a single unit.As a beta tester of iOS 17 I won't deduct a star for compatibility issues. The iOS 16 device as a workaround, while functional, does underscore the need for swift resolution by Bose.The Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar, with AirPlay 2 and HomeKit, coupled with its noteworthy audio prowess, is definitely and attractive option in the soundbar arena. For those seeking an elegant soundbar that seamlessly integrates with their Apple-oriented ecosystem while delivering high-quality audio, the Bose Smart Ultra Soundbar warrants serious consideration.

This top of the line Bose soundbar not only sounds great but has so many ways to listen to music as well and it's so simple to use.My setup is a recent Sony TV (with eARC support) and an AppleTV 4K.Initial setup was straightforward: Connected the Soundbar to the HDMI output with eARC support, and power cable. The eARC connection allows sound from the TV to the Soundbar and it's the only option that supports Dolby Atmos. The Soundbar also has an optical connector which I did not use. It comes with the power, HDMI and optical cables.There is no sound from the soundbar yet. One needs to install the Bose music app on a mobile phone or tablet. I already have a Bose Smart Speaker and Bluetooth headphones so my account was already set up. The install process though ... MoreThis top of the line Bose soundbar not only sounds great but has so many ways to listen to music as well and it's so simple to use.My setup is a recent Sony TV (with eARC support) and an AppleTV 4K.Initial setup was straightforward: Connected the Soundbar to the HDMI output with eARC support, and power cable. The eARC connection allows sound from the TV to the Soundbar and it's the only option that supports Dolby Atmos. The Soundbar also has an optical connector which I did not use. It comes with the power, HDMI and optical cables.There is no sound from the soundbar yet. One needs to install the Bose music app on a mobile phone or tablet. I already have a Bose Smart Speaker and Bluetooth headphones so my account was already set up. The install process though the app was quick and simple, until the step where one has co wear a headband with a mic on, that is used just once to calibrate the soundbar to the room and where one would be sitting while watching TV. I wish this could've been done using the cell phone itself but the wired mic on a headband must be more accurate. This is done once so that's fine (It can be re-run from the app though). Bose calls this 'ADAPTiQ'.The size is right for a 55" or larger TV. Anything smaller and the soundbar will be wider than the TV.It has a nice finish with matte finish on the sides and a glass top.There are no buttons on the soundbar except for mic mute and voice assistant buttons that are touch-sensitive from the glass top.One of the distinguishing features is that it has actual height speakers (For Dolby Atmos) which are cut through the glass top and fire upwards.It also works as an Amazon Alexa assistant, and supports playing from the TV, Bluetooth, with an excellent device management from the app, Apple Airplay 2 with Apple Home support, DLNA, Chromecast (with direct play support from a server), Spotify Connect and from the Bose Music app, which itself supports some of the most common sources like Amazon Music, iHeart Radio, TuneIn, Pandora, SiriusXM and Spotify. When playing through the Bose app, the phone doesn’t need to be near the soundbar once it starts playing, as it connects directly.It has a simple remote control with a few buttons but if used with a TV, volume can be controlled from either the TV remote or the AppleTV remote (Or other HDMI connected streamer), as well as from the Bose app on the phone.When watching TV, the app indicates what kind of audio it's receiving, like PCM or Dolby Atmos.So to the sound: As expected, sound is very crisp with good amount of bass. Bass, treble, center and height controls are on the app.To test stereo separation, streamed some tracks with good stereo separation and I'm impressed how it's obviously distinct between left and right.Sound is very detailed. Subtleties in audio tracks can be heard at lower volumes.It can (and should) be set to also enhance speech content, which I've also seen in other high end soundbars.An external wireless (power cord only) bass module and rear speaker are also available.This is Bose's best soundbar, and it's truly excellent for both TV and music and excellent connectivity options.