The Devialet Dione proves you can get a full range of sound without a separate subwoofer… but it comes with some downsides.
The reason that the best soundbars are so popular right now is that they can give you the feeling of a big, impactful theater system, but without the hassle of trying to fit in multiple speakers and wiring them all up. They’re so much smaller and easier to accommodate. But if you want your soundbar to be as low-footprint as possible, you have a difficult choice: do you get a soundbar with a separate subwoofer, so that you get the full range of sound down to deep bass, but with more space taken up in your room; or do you get a single-unit soundbar with no subwoofer, but less impactful bass. Lots of people are choosing the latter, partly for convenience (just two cables to set up a system and you’re away), and partly because a lot of people still think of a subwoofer as something that unnecessarily shakes the walls. That’s a shame – because a good sub doesn’t rattle the shelves, but does add an underlying foundation of bass to soundtracks that makes a huge difference to the realism of some scenes. The example I like to give isn’t in action soundtracks or sci-fi effects, but when I watched a movie set by the sea, with huge crashing waves that should be moody and threatening. Without a subwoofer, they splash; with a sub, they thunder into the ocean with realistic power and menace. It’s more true to life, and reflects how the movie was meant to be heard. Now finally, there’s a single-unit soundbar that delivers genuinely deep bass: the Devialet Dione.
