Sony Z9F 3.1ch Sound bar with Dolby Atmos and Wireless Subwoofer (HT-Z9F)

Primary function is to listen to local radio stations, and generally play music throughout our condo. We accomplish this with several Alexa products set up for multi room music. The second function is to provide sound for out TV. An added bonus is being able to simply turn on my wireless earbuds, later at night, to mute the TV Sound. All of this is easy to set up and works seamlessly. On the other hand, though adequate I found The maximum sound level using my earbuds was too low and I was straining to hear clearly,

I am so impressed with the Sony HT-Z9F 3.1 Ch. Dolby Atmos® DTS:X™ Wireless Soundbar. Sony has always been a brand I trust when it comes to quality products and they have once again shown me why I always go back to them for electronic purchases. This soundbar is better than what I imagined. The setup was very easy and took hardly anytime at all. Just a few plug ins here and there and I was ready to go. I only needed to review the manual once or twice, because I have a 8K Smart tv and needed to do a few extra settings to make sure everything synched correctly. My tv is a 75 inch and I needed a really good soundbar that would provide amazing sound quality for such a large television. This soundbar definitely made that happen. The look is the soundbar is simple and sleep and looks great against my full entertainment system. I do have to use two remotes to control the tv and soundbar separately, but that really isn’t an issue. In the beginning I did gave problems with the subwoofer cutting out just during movies. It would happen 2-3 times and for only a few seconds. I even moved the subwoofer to the back of the room to provide a larger space for sound, but it still continued with the cutting out. After a little research and digging I found that this was a common issue with a simple reset fix. After resetting the soundbar I have not noticed it cutting out anymore. Everything is perfect and I couldn’t have asked for a better sound quality! I would definitely recommend it!

This is a great product! The setup was really easy. The remote control is one of the best I have seen. I have a Sony TV (with dolby atmos) so the remote will turn the TV or the soundbar off and on at the same time right out of the box, which is nice. I also got the SA-Z9R rear speakers, which are definitely worth it as you can really tell the difference. Only hiccup was no sound from the rear speakers, which I finally figured out was because the sound source I was using on YouTube was not multichannel dolby so there was no signal sound on the rear channel. The sound is great! Just remember that if you aren't using a dolby sound signal you won't get the full benefit of the system.

Unbelievable sound so glad i spent the extra few hundred nothing bad to say Highly recommend this product if your gunna spend for a big screen television pls spend the money to upgrade the sound you will not be sorry

TLDR: you will read about wireless issues in many reviews. These are not unique to this sound bar, search any other wireless sound bar and see the same complaints. All the speakers can be run wired, completely eliminating "wireless" cutout and providing fantastic 3.1 (this item) or 5.1 (with Z9R) sound. The only reason this is 4 stars instead of 5 is because Sony chose not to document the wired capability as an option!Full Review:I've been dragging my large amplifier and speakers around for 10 years, but was really trying to downsize my system. The sound produced by this system rivals my previous setup, taking up far much less space. I wish it was more reliable wirelessly, or that the wired connections were actually documented, thus 4 stars instead of 5. If you're struggling with the wifi cutouts, read on.Having read comments in other reviews about wireless issues, I did some preparatory research before buying. Many people expect plug-and-play and don't spend the time to troubleshoot. I felt based on the many "solutions" I read elsewhere that I could eventually solve any problem.It did take me a few weeks of experimentation to completely eliminate the wireless issues, but only because I was trying to collect as much data as I could for this review. You can solve the problems all at once with inexpensive aux cables.The sound quality is excellent. I've found the best results changing from "Sound Mode: On" (the pseudo-Atmos setting) to the "Dolby Speaker Virtualizer" which passes through 5.1 Dolby when media has it, and does a great job giving a surround effect for non-Dolby content. There are options to increase the volume of voices (2 settings) which I've found useful for some dialog-heavy movies and sports (with announcers) but tend to make music sound a bit tinnier. It's good to have these choices easily changeable with the remote. There's an option to auto-adjust the volume when it gets too loud -- don't use this. If you thought wifi cutouts drove you nuts, constant abrupt volume adjustments are even worse!Wireless troubleshooting and solution:The key point to understand troubleshooting the wireless cutouts is that the wireless capability is standard WiFi -- the soundbar becomes a router (you can even see the "SurroundMaster_*" SSID) and the speakers connect to it just like any wifi device. It probably works just fine out of the box if it's the only wireless device in the room. If your main house router or mesh system is anywhere near the sound bar, you'll get the sound cut outs. I've spent 3 weeks testing various configurations and suggest the following escalating steps to resolve wifi issues:1. Make sure your sound bar isn't too close to the TV itself. The metal will interfere with the wifi. About 4 inches is sufficient separation.2. If you have another wifi router, move it a few feet away, or much lower, or block direct line of sight with a piece of furniture.3. By default the Z9F's wifi router will "Frequency Hop" to find a channel that doesn't conflict with your router. This is fine for older routers, but if you have a newer router or mesh system that *also* frequency hops, the systems will keep trying to dodge around each other. It's best to fix one or the other. See instructions page 34 to turn "RF Channel" to "Off" to keep the same channel on the Z9F.4. Related to 3, if you take a minute or two when you first turn the Z9F on to toggle "RF Channel" off and on again, you'll keep a stable connection while the sound bar is on, as it will find a good channel and your router will stay away from it. Only if/when you put the soundbar in standby will your home router stomp on that good channel.The above 4 steps should solve most issues. However, I didn't like having to repeat step 4 daily, so I decided to wire my system. *This is not documented in the instructions, but is amply explained online in many places, with pictures.*. I've added pictures to my review showing the location of the ports, use a razor blade to peel up the plastic covers. The Z9F has three 3.5mm Aux ports (standard headphone jack) on the back under a plastic cover near the HDMI connections, labeled RL, RR, and SW. The subwoofer and Z9R rear speakers have corresponding 3.5mm Aux ports.5. If your soundbar is wall mounted, you'll need to make sure the cable has a 90 degree angle to fit, plus enough extra depth to go into the jack without being blocked by the surrounding metal. Also you should use a higher quality cord. I am using the Hftywy cables here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08CCFJXPZ6. After wiring the speaker(s), unplug them and replug them in. You'll know they're wired if you get the "yellow" light instead of a green one.7. It may be sufficient just to wire the subwoofer. This reduces the wifi bandwidth needed for those sounds and lets the Z9F's wifi focus solely on the rear speakers.8. If you really want to forever eliminate wireless issues, wire the rear speakers as well. (This is where higher quality cables become more important as I needed a 25 and 30 foot cable.