But for those that aren't and are, we suggest that you keep the YHT-S's receiver on an open shelf preferably as far away from boundaries as possible. With the front port of the bass reflex design, you'll at least not have to worry about keeping it off the wall.
But side boundaries may create bass bloat. That being said, Yamaha may have had in-cabinet placement in mind when they designed the YHT-S and could be counting on it when they rated the system down to 35Hz.
Honestly, they only gave the total frequency response without any qualifications do don't be surprised if the system doesn't perform in your room as well as you'd expect it will probably outperform what we expect but we don't expect much. On the receiver side, you've got 3 HDMI inputs and one output and a number of sound enhancement modes.
The enhancement modes include the already mentioned Air Surround Xtreme for pseudo-surround, UniVolume for maintaining a consistent volume across content basically to keep commercials from blowing you out of your seat , Compressed Music Enhancer for all your MP3 needs, and a handful of other DSP modes.
While the packaging may make it sound like the YHT-S is iPod and Bluetooth compatible out of the box, these actually take additional add-ons.
This is standard operating proceedure for Yamaha and is in place with most of its receiver offerings. While it is sort of obvious that we dissapprove of mating a receiver and a subwoofer, the rest of the YHT-S package sounds pretty good.
The soundbar should work well under most flatpanels though it probably looks best under a 50" and the receiver has enough functionality for most first time buyers. The YHT-S is made up of two components — the NS-BR passive front speaker system coincidentally the slimmest soundbar in the world at just 50mm high and the SR, a separate AV receiver that boasts an integrated subwoofer.
It looks like a regular AV receiver, except for the appearance of a huge port in the front panel. Also on the fascia is a large display showing the current source and sound mode, plus power, input and volume buttons on the left. We were expecting a veritable telephone exchange of sockets on the back panel, but the selection is surprisingly stripped down. Most importantly, you get three p-capable HDMI inputs and one output, letting you switch between your various hi-def sources, plus optical digital and analogue stereo audio inputs.
Yamaha has always been an audio pioneer and as such has loaded the system with a plethora of sound modes to enhance your listening pleasure. Yamaha claims its system allows you to distinctly identify sounds behind you, as well as enjoy clear separation between the front and centre channels.
Completing this impressive array is UniVolume, which maintains a consistent listening level no matter how intrusive the adverts get. You can set the levels of the centre, surround, front and subwoofer channels, adjust the bass, treble and delay and configure the HDMI sockets. Additional on-board digital amplification delivers 3x 50 Watts to the soundbar speaker, which comprises three 10x 4cm drivers.
At just 50mm in height, the slimline soundbar tucks neatly beneath most TVs and virtually disappeared below our inch plasma. Its feet can be adjusted both vertically and horizontally, or removed altogether to suit placement under most to inch screens. And with the AV receiver tucked away the Yamaha system does a veritable disappearing act — perfect for those who prefer hardware discretion as opposed to the usual boxfest and cabling everywhere.
The receiver itself offers fairly decent connections with three HDMI inputs and a single out. It's not a full-blown unit though and doesn't come close to the features and specs of your typical AV receiver. There's no on-board video decoding, for example, nor is there any processing of the main surround audio formats although it will accept linear PCM HD audio via HDMI from a suitable source, ie, Blu-ray player.
It does have a couple of surround tricks of its own though — namely Yamaha's 24kHz HRTF Head Related Transfer Function which "scientifically" aims to convince your ears the sound is multi-directional.
The other is an Extended Stereo mode that is said to give the impression that the soundbar is, in fact, a pair of loudspeakers some two metres apart.
If being prepared to have a fresh think about something as straightforward as an affordable soundbar counts for anything, Yamaha deserves much applause for this product — even if it's capable of creating as many problems as it solves. The soundbar itself, while certainly slim and discreet despite housing two 25mm tweeters and four 75mm drivers, is no groundbreaker. And the need to wire it six times to the subwoofer makes it an altogether fiddlier system to integrate into your front room than other easily available soundbars.
Innovative subwoofer impresses No, it's the subwoofer that makes the YHT-S stand apart from the herd. It looks like a multichannel amplifier albeit one with a great big reflex port at one end of the fascia and as well as providing power to the soundbar it features three HDMI inputs, one output, digital optical and stereo RCA analogue inputs, a socket for use with Yamaha's YDS iPod dock and an FM tuner.
Consequently it's able to handle inputs from your Blu-ray or DVD player, set-top box and games console, say, without any groping around to change connections.
Of course, a subwoofer configured like this is crying out to be put on an equipment rack and the hardwiring to the soundbar demands it be close by , but a big speaker vibrating away among your electronics is hardly ideal.
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