Ask HN: It's 2017, why isn't there an easy option for surround sound?

Here's what I want:

A small router-sized device that has an HDMI input, supports ARC, and can power my surround sound speakers.

Why is that so hard?

It seems odd that I'm forced to buy a giant A/V receiver with 10 inputs, hundreds of settings, am/fm radio, a microphone jack, and a headset jack.

I mean, do they really think I'm going to listen to fm radio while dancing around in my living room wearing a headset with a ten foot cord? The eighties were over 30 years ago!

All I want to do is hook up my TV to surround speakers and get the same functionality I get from the A/V system, minus the giant size and all the other features, displays, and dials I don't need.

4 comments

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jackfraser 8y ago ↗

Amplifiers that can power loudspeakers without sounding terrible take up a certain amount of space. That said, many smaller/cheaper alternatives end up getting packaged in larger form factors than they need so as to avoid looking cheap.

A powerful receiver is the backbone of your audio system, though, and so if you want good sound, eventually you'll just have to give in and buy one. Get a nice shelving unit to put it in and make it part of your room, not something to hide.

KineticTroi 8y ago ↗

Consumer audio has seemed to have lagged behind other technologies by seemingly 20 years. Why? It's a great question. I had once thought self powered speakers would take over audio, but never seems to happen. Look at all of the TV's being sold with terrible audio built in. We still seem to be dickering about with consumer love for the 3.5 mechanical audio jack. There are some really cool t-class amps on ebay with Bluetooth. Perhaps combined with an hdmi surround audio extractor, also on ebay, you could custom build something to your needs. You might have a hard time syncing all of the separate audio channels with Bluetooth though.

PaulHoule 8y ago ↗

You can get the size of an amplifier down with class D technology, but I am seriously annoyed at the whole "let's make tiny expensive speakers that cost $1200 a pair that sound worse than the $40 a pair speakers I picked up at a yard sale that belonged to a teenager who played the guitar in the 1970s" thing.

telebone_man 8y ago ↗

I personally have a Sonos soundbar, which connects to the digital output of my TV. The soundbar then connects to my home router (either via wifi or ethernet).

Then I connect my subwoofer and 2 surrounds to the same router. And the soundbar distributes the relevant audio channels over wifi.

In this scenario, the soundbar is your 'small router-sized device', however it's the size of a sound bar..

I can't fault the sound of the system as a whole. I think it sounds great.