Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 41
 Wonderful Two-Piece System May 11, 2010
Stanley Porter (Detroit, MI)
I was looking for something compact and inexpensive to use in my bedroom. I shopped all the stores and settled on the Bose Cinemate system. What a big disappointment. It sounded great in the store but when I got it home it was terrible. It had very little volume, no bass, no sound adjustment and it cost almost $500. Then I discovered the Yamaha YAS-71BL through Amazon.com reviews. I placed my order and it was on my doorstep in two days. This is a wonderful system. Easy to connect with one digital optical cable. That's it. It has tons of volume, room shaking bass and everything is adjustable from the compact, easy to operate remote. I have been watching the HBO series The Pacific and in most scenes the surround sound capabilities of this system are decent. Bullets from over there, bombs going off in the foreground, background and side are easily distinguished. The dialog from the center channel is clear, not muddy like the Bose system. I am especially happy because I paid $150 for this system (used) through Amazon.com. This system is the best bang for the buck that I have ever come across! If you can find this system at this price buy it. I'm trying to get another one.
Yamaha Sound Bar April 11, 2010
R. Mclain (Rockton, IL)
The price was great! It came within two days although it was scheduled for much longer. Using the optical cable the hook up was a breeze. After toying with it a little, I found that the sound actually does seem like its coming from behind you on the surround. It was kinda of freaky without rear speakers. I have not tried the bluetooth yet, but hope to. Matches the tv perfectly and sounds excellent.
 Best SoundBar for my Needs April 9, 2010
C. Valle (Las Cruces, NM USA)
I have to say for my needs this is a great sound bar. What my goal for buying this item was to provide a speaker system for my newly purchased Plasma TV with a single cable, Panasonic VIERA X1 Series TC-P42X1 42-Inch 720p Plasma HDTV. The problem with the television that I found affects not only Plasma TV's but LCD's as well is the speakers on the TV are either behind or at the bottom of the TV. At times it would seem no matter how high I put the TV I couldn't hear every word spoken. This problem didn't help when it's summer the Air Conditioner is always running and in winter the space heaters are running and on real cold nights the wall mounted gas heater runs and none of this runs quiet.
My solution was to purchase speakers that will point forward so that I could hear the television above all the other racket and I also wanted a sub woofer to accompany it because those lower frequency levels can never be produced by any television. The other benefit I found was I would be able to connect this sound bar to my television with a single cable, Belkin PureAV Digital Optical Audio Cable (12 Feet). My reasoning behind this was to have my all my devices connect to the TV directly: a Panasonic DMP-BD60 1080p Blu-ray Disc Player, a Philips DVD player both connected via HDMI, a Wii connected by component cables, and a TiVo Series 2 connected via coaxial cable. Then the single optical cable comes out from the television into the sound bar and all my sounds come out of the sound bar. The television had an option to have the audio turn off, like a permanent mute without a visual indication.
The other reason I preferred this sound bar was it provided a sound system without running cables all over the floor in all directions. The unit sits in front of the plasma TV and the sub-woofer fits perfectly right below in a television stand that I purchased from Wal-mart. Putting the sound bar in front of the TV was not a problem with the remote control as long as I aimed it just above the sound bar. Anytime the remote control was below the sound bar any functions for the TV would not respond. I found it only affected me few times as the volume was controlled by the Sound bar, channels would change on the Tivo. The only time it would be be affected is when using the macros on the remote to change the TV's inputs.
I rounded this setup with a Logitech Harmony 550 Universal Remote. This was definitely worth every cent and even though it uses 4 AAA batteries the amount of batteries needed to run every device remote would be 10 batteries (2 TV, 2 TiVo, 2 Blu-ray, 2 DVD, 2 Soundbar) plus the amount of space for 5 remotes versus 1 remote. The only thing I would say is setting it up on the computer took time to figure out and make it work the way I wanted.
The other great thing about using the remote is the ability to program macros for those who don't know what they are they are a set of steps pre-programmed into the remote which activates with a single button push. As an example watching Tv with the TiVo: pushing the macro button would turn the TV on, set it to channel 3, turn the Tivo on and turn the speakers on. Doing this the long way would require the use of 3 remotes and at least 4 buttons pushes in that sequence which would require every family member or anyone using this to remember that.
 46 days and dead April 8, 2010
Warchild (NC)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I got the Soundbar as a sort of compromise for a small space. The sound was thin and unsatisfying but still preferable to the sound of the Panasonic TV. I also got the over priced dock for the iPod. For music the sound was also thin but better than the iHome alarm clock, not much better but the extra bass compensated.
I wasn't thrilled with the purchase but it was adequate.
Until on day 46 the unit turned on and then turned itself off within seconds. I did all the trouble shooting to no avail. The unit was powered through a surge protector and none of the other equipment was damaged.
I called Yamaha and met with a decidely "so what" attitude. They clearly could care less. They agreed the unit was broken and probably not my fault. But said there was nothing they could do and told me to go to the website and contact the service center.
I did. Was told that I'd have to mail it, at my expense to a place 800 miles away and I could expect an 8 week turnaround . . .
So I paid 300 for a piece of junk. I was once given a junky Koss 5.1 system that cost about 50 bucks. It lasted for years and sounded much better than the Yamaha.
I'm buying a Sony system and would never consider a Yamaha anything ever again. Failed components happen but bad attitude customer service and 2 months repair time are totally unacceptable.
Sounds great March 28, 2010
Doodlebug (Nashville, TN)
I've had this soundbar for about a year or so. I am very pleased with this system.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 41
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