Focal Mu-So Hekla Soundbar Review: Dolby Atmos With 1 Speaker

I watched Avatar: Fire and Ash utilizing the Fandango astatine Home app, and successful 1 scene, there’s an alarm chime during an onslaught series that fills the room. A main quality is moving retired of oxygen, and you tin perceive the informing beeps determination from the broadside to the center. Even erstwhile I watched Crime 101 utilizing the Amazon Prime app, the droning synths and pounding drums sounded ultrarealistic, adjacent compared to my ain floor-standing speakers. All bully truthful far, but I volition beryllium funny to get my hands connected the LG Sound Suite speakers, due to the fact that they are the archetypal to enactment Dolby Atmos FlexConnect, which lets you enactment speakers anywhere. With the soundbar, sub, front, and rear speakers, the LG strategy could beryllium a apical prime for its unsocial feature, conscionable arsenic the Mu-so Hekla is for its one-box setup.

For movies, the Mu-so Hekla could adjacent regenerate an AV receiver if you are space-constrained. I hatred moving talker ligament everywhere, truthful a stand-alone talker does person a definite appeal. In side-by-side testing, however, a afloat multiple-speaker setup is much similar a movie theater.

Games, News, Sports, and Everything Else

Using the DirecTV streaming app, I watched a hockey game, a quality broadcast, and respective tv shows. During the NHL game, I could perceive the announcers adjacent with the assemblage sound and blaring horns. A David Muir quality broadcast connected ABC was besides wide and distinct. I was disquieted the Hekla’s full-throttle bass would overwhelm those broadcasts, but it was much subdued and made the main halfway vocals dependable clear.

For games, I felt Forza Horizon 5 was not arsenic convincing for situation dependable arsenic the movies and shows. You would expect to perceive cars zooming by connected the broadside and rear channels acknowledgment to the audio drivers, but it didn’t consciousness similar I was transported to the racetrack. My existent gaming obsession, Crimson Desert, besides didn’t stroke maine distant with surround-sound audio, though the sweeping epic people of that crippled sounded overmuch amended than the Sony Bravia Theater System 6 soundbar, particularly astatine afloat volume.

Movies are specifically designed for Dolby Atmos, though, truthful it’s not a astonishment that the games I tested didn’t make a cocoon of situation sound. In fact, that’s the main takeaway here: The Mu-so Hekla soundbar is my apical prime for movies and Atmos albums arsenic a stand-alone speaker. The Cambridge Audio Evo One is simply a amended stand-alone talker for music. If you adhd aggregate speakers and a sub to the Sonos Arc Ultra, the terms is astir the aforesaid arsenic the Mu-so Hekla, and the Atmos situation dependable is akin successful wide quality. If you’re choky connected abstraction oregon privation the champion imaginable Atmos acquisition from 1 speaker, the Mu-so Hekla is the champion option.

Note that this soundbar is presently lone disposable done Focal dealers; you whitethorn beryllium capable to bid it implicit the phone, but it's amended to sojourn a section showroom and perceive for yourself.