How four speakers can rival a dedicated 12-channel home theatre setup

Getting big home theatre sound without the complexity and space required for a fully wired system has long been the goal for all-in-one solutions like soundbars. Yet while they might be a big step up from TV speakers, they often fail to deliver an immersive surround sound experience.

The HT-A9 from Sony has even loftier ambitions. Using just four small wireless units placed anywhere in your room, it aims to deliver all the scale and sound of a dedicated 12-channel speaker system. And not only does it succeed, outperforming every soundbar for engrossing audio, it even rivals my wired 7.1.4 system (that’s seven speakers at ear level, one sub woofer and four speakers in the ceiling).

The four units that make up Sony’s HT-A9 can be placed just about anywhere.

The HT-A9’s units each house one upwards-firing driver for bouncing sound off the ceiling and back down to your ears, one front-firing driver and one tweeter, delivering 4.0.4 channel audio. That means there’s no centre speaker and no subwoofer included, though you can buy the latter separately (more on that later).

All four units require a power outlet, and connect wirelessly to a control box which looks a lot like an Apple TV. The control box sports a HDMI 2.1 input for connecting extra devices like a games console, as well as a HDMI output for connecting to the TV’s eARC port.

At 30 centimetres in height and around half the depth of traditional bookshelf speakers, the wireless units are remarkably compact, while the gray fabric grilles are designed to blend in with the rest of your living room.

The wireless units do a great job directing the sound, but you’ll want to invest in a subwoofer as well.

The magic is how the setup uses psychoacoustic techniques and sound optimisation to create 12 ‘phantom’ speakers for sound that resembles a 7.1.4 system.

When first firing up the speakers you will need to step through a minute-long auto calibration process which uses the dual microphones built into each unit to map out the dimensions of the room, including the distance between each speaker and the height of the ceiling. From those calculations, the system creates its own virtual dome of sound using Sony’s 360 Spatial Sound Mapping.

Unlike traditional soundbars, which sound front heavy and boxed in, the enveloping sound of the HT-A9 actually sounds like you have 12 physical speakers carefully positioned throughout the room. Regardless of whether I was watching movies or playing games, the clarity of the imaging and separation of different objects in the soundscape was crystal clear and well defined. It didn’t sound like objects were travelling from one speaker to the next, instead they panned smoothly around and above the room.

The sheer resolution and detail retrieval of the HT-A9, particularly in content that sports a spatial audio mix such as The Matrix and The Quiet Place Part II, meant I heard little details that I missed entirely on my 7.1.4 speaker system.

Without a centre speaker, Sony relies on its phantom speaker tech to deliver dialogue and, once again, it sounded clear and intelligible throughout. In many ways the centre fill sounded better, as it was less directional and more dispersed than what you would normally get with a dedicated centre channel.

The HT-A9’s mapping is so accurate in fact that, unlike traditional home theatre speakers, you can put the speakers just about anywhere and don’t need to worry about having them orientated at the same height and distance.

I put mine on a tall bookshelf, a side table behind the couch, a media cabinet below the television and a coffee table closer to the ground. To my surprise, I didn’t notice any dropoff in audio quality when compared to having them in their ideal speaker positions. Just keep in mind that you will need to run through the calibration process every time you move any of the speakers.

The HT-A9 equally shined with music, particularly 360 Audio supported tracks on services like Tidal, boasting plenty of clarity and a wide soundstage. Home theatre systems rarely sound great with music, so this is a big win for the HT-A9.

However, the HT-A9’s attempt to replicate a phantom subwoofer was far from convincing, making the ‘optional’ wireless subwoofer that Sony sells separately a mandatory purchase.

At $2299 plus $999 for the optional sub, the HT-A9 won’t be for everyone. But when you consider that it delivers a level of immersive sound that other soundbars can’t while also taking up less space and offering flexible placement, the HT-A9 is hard to beat.

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