Sony BDV-N8100W 3D Blu-Ray Home Theater System Preview

Not to be outdone by rivals, Sony has updated its packaged home theater system lineup for 2013, with the BDV-N8100W Premium 3D Blu-Ray HT System leading the charge. Priced at $699.99, which is less than the cost of a foot of some snake oil infused speaker wire, Sony has packed a veritable cornucopia of features into their latest and greatest home theater package, including a 3D capable Blu-Ray player, 4K upscaling, and Wi-Fi connectivity. Of course with so many features packed in for the money, how good could the audio experience be? Read on to find out what we think.

Features, Features, Features

A quick visit to the product page of the BDV-N8100W will reveal that Sony has shoehorned quite a lot into their premium home theater system: there are no less than 22 individual features listed. While a good number of these are likely to be considered worthless fluff by most (do we really need "Football Mode"?).  There's a lot to like here, including: dual HDMI inputs; wireless networking and streaming for Netflix, YouTube, HuluPlus, et al; and "wireless" rear speakers courtesy of a wirelessly fed stereo amplifier that powers the surround channels. In terms of raw feature set, the BDV-N8100W seems reasonably all inclusive, even letting you get on Facebook and Twitter via a Socialize application.

The Audio

Features are great; I like cool toys as much as the next guy, but let's face it, this is Audioholics, and we want to know how Sony's top HTIB can perform. Starting with the basics, the main speakers sport a 25mm tweeter and a pair of 80mm (that's a hair over 3" for those averse to the metric system) woofers in a vented configuration. The center speaker interestingly features a different configuration: a 20mm tweeter and a pair of 60mm woofers in a vented alignment, while the surround speaker shares the 20mm tweeter of the center channel and mates it with an 80mm woofer from the main speakers. The subwoofer (if you want to call it that) boasts a 180mm (7") woofer in a vented alignment.

An 80mm woofer from Sony's BDV-N8100W

Suffice it to say, judging by the size of the drive units alone, the audio performance of this system isn't going to be much to write home about. 180mm does not a subwoofer make, though for the price we can understand Sony can’t squeeze in a pair of SVS PB13-Ultras. What’s a little more problematic in our view is the use of a pair of 60mm “woofers” on the center speaker. At slightly under 2.4”, we’re talking about a drive unit slightly smaller than what is utilized by a Bose cube. Consequently, we expect Sony’s center speaker to suffer one big flaw, namely being unable to effectively dig deep enough to successfully blend with a subwoofer. At best, the included subwoofer is going to have to shoot for an abnormally high crossover frequency, which can lead to issues of localization. At worst, there could be a hole in the system response stemming from the speaker which handles the bulk of the content in a home theater.

Summary

Dollar for dollar, we’d expect you’d have a hard time finding a system boasting a more robust feature set than Sony’s BDV-N8100W. Still, if you’re chasing top notch audio performance on a budget, one should be aware that the sleek form factor brings some drawbacks that are tough to overcome. To be fair, Sony is hardly the only one chasing slick looks that complement a flat screen TV and letting audio performance take a back seat.  Competitors like the Samsung HT-E6730W and LG BH9420PW appear to suffer from the same drawbacks. Still, it wouldn’t be a big stretch to expect that a system like Onkyo’s HT-S7500 plus a newer streaming Blu-ray player could offer significantly better audio performance over Sony’s system for not much more coin, albeit at the expense of some aesthetics.

Unless otherwise indicated, this is a preview article for the featured product. A formal review may or may not follow in the future.