Q800T

Overview

The HW-Q800T is a 2020 Q-Series soundbar from Samsung with Dolby Atmos, DTS:X and Alexa built in. The bar is 980 mm wide, 60 mm high and 115 mm deep, comes in black, and can be wall-mounted with the wall mount kit in the box.

It is a 3.1.2 system with a wireless subwoofer in the box. Samsung lists eight speakers, a center speaker, two up-firing channels, a wide range tweeter and a total power of 330 W.

The TV connects over HDMI eARC with the included HDMI cable, or over optical. The bar also has an HDMI input, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. Over Wi-Fi it works with Spotify and the SmartThings app on iOS and Android, and the built-in Alexa takes voice commands without a separate Echo device.

Samsung lists the sound modes Surround Sound Expansion, Game Pro, Standard and Adaptive. Samsung says Adaptive Sound analyzes the content and adjusts the sound for each scene. With a compatible Samsung QLED TV, Q-Symphony plays the TV speakers together with the soundbar, and the TV remote controls the soundbar (Samsung OneRemote). The bar also has touch buttons and comes with its own remote.

What the specs mean

• 3.1.2 speaker setup: three main channels (left, center, right), a subwoofer channel and two height channels. Samsung describes the two height channels as up-firing.
• HDMI eARC: the enhanced Audio Return Channel sends the TV's sound to the soundbar over HDMI. HDMI.org lists support for Dolby TrueHD, Dolby Atmos, DTS-HD Master Audio and DTS:X, and uncompressed 5.1 and 7.1 audio.
• Audio formats: Dolby Atmos, Dolby TrueHD, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby Digital, DTS:X, DTS-HD Master Audio and DTS Digital Surround.
• HDMI passthrough (4K, HDR10 and HDR10+): a streaming box or console connects to the soundbar's HDMI input, and the soundbar passes the picture on to the TV.
• No room correction: the HW-Q800T has no automatic room calibration.
• Wireless surrounds: the HW-Q800T works with the Samsung SWA-9000S and SWA-9100S wireless rear speaker kits.