Cinema 800 Soundbar

Overview

The Cinema 800 is a 2020 Dolby Atmos soundbar from Klipsch's Cinema series. The bar is 1219 mm wide, 73 mm high and 86 mm deep, comes in black and can be wall-mounted with the brackets and template in the box. A 10-inch wireless subwoofer is included and pairs with the bar automatically.

Klipsch lists three 1-inch soft dome tweeters mated to Tractrix horns and four 3-inch oval midrange woofers in a wood enclosure, a dedicated centre channel, and 800 W system power.

The TV connects over HDMI eARC (an HDMI cable is in the box) or optical, and two HDMI inputs take other sources. There are also a 3.5 mm analog input, Bluetooth 5.0, Wi-Fi and a wired subwoofer output for a second subwoofer. Over Wi-Fi the bar supports Spotify Connect and Chromecast, and works with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant.

The included backlit remote controls volume, input, subwoofer level, surround level and sound mode, and the bar has touch controls. The Klipsch Connect app (iOS and Android) works as a virtual remote. Klipsch lists three levels of dialogue enhancement. The box also contains AA batteries, the power cords and the manuals.

What the specs mean

• 3.1 speaker setup: three main channels (left, centre and right) plus the wireless subwoofer. There are no surround or height speakers in the box. Klipsch states that the bar decodes Dolby Atmos up to 7.1.4.
• Wireless surrounds: a pair of Klipsch Surround 3 speakers adds rear channels wirelessly and turns the system into 5.1.
• HDMI eARC: the enhanced Audio Return Channel sends the TV's sound to the soundbar over HDMI, with enough bandwidth for Dolby TrueHD and Dolby Atmos.
• Audio formats: Dolby Atmos, Dolby TrueHD, Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby Digital.
• HDMI passthrough (HDR10, Dolby Vision, HDCP 2.3): a console or player connects to one of the HDMI inputs, and the bar passes the video on to the TV with HDR10 or Dolby Vision. Klipsch describes it as 8K HDR passthrough.
• No room correction: the system has no automatic room calibration.