The sound on my living room LG TV was awful. I looked more at the picture when choosing it (it was one of those presents where the loved one takes you to the store and lets you choose). The dialogue wasn't bad but the music was painful to listen to, and it would have been a pain to run it through the stereo. I didn't want an actual sound bar. They don't really fit my cabinet, and no one here is into surround sound or anything. I ended up with a Bose. I forget what it's called, but the TV can stand on it (flatscreen), and it fits on the turntable in the cabinet. The sound quality is surprisingly good, and I was able to program it into the Aux on the regular remote so that the sound buttons would work along with the channel, etc. The music sounds like music now, and the dialogue is clearer as well. The incidental sound effects are also clearer. It's like the way the speakers should have been all along.

Having poor speakers allows them to sell monitors and TVs flatter and cheaper, and I'm just resigned to having to have separate speakers for everything nowadays. I think the Bose was definitely worth the money. There are sound bars for a lot less but I don't know about the sound quality for them.

I don't know if they're fully implemented yet, but there are supposed to be TVs and related equipment, on which you can adjust the different tracks yourself, boosting the dialogue sound and reducing the music, etc.

That said, the kitchen TV, which is a smaller Samsung, has acceptable sound all by itself.

Our flat-screen sounded awful, I could hardly understand what they were saying. We just use a set of computer speakers with a sub-woofer (a small one) and it sounds fabulous. We had a sound bar that we bought for $60 and it worked fine as well. We had these computer speakers and loved the sound of them, so we sold the sound bar.

Glad to know I'm not the only one that can't hear dialogue. It is amazing that bars go from 100-500. I do have some computer speakers laying around but I want to be as wireless as possible. Thanks for your input

Most of the TVs don't have very good quality speakers. We have a full home theater system in the living room so we have very good sound quality. In the RV we need to get a supplemental speaker system because the TV just doesn't cut it. I have a good Bluetooth speaker I need to try in there. We could put it anywhere, closer to our chairs.

I have a really good set of speakers and subwoofer on my desktop, I might try them out and buy another set. I don't anything massive for the rv.

Our tv sits on a cabinet so the speakers and sub-woofer sit behind it (to the side). They plug into the headphone jack. Nice and tidy.

We have the single unit Bose in the kitchen, love it. Have surround in the living room. We watch in the kitchen 99.9% of the time.

Bossy does your TV have bluetooth? A battery operated bluetooth speaker would be entirely wireless. You can get decent bluetooth speakers for pretty cheap. I am thinking about those and setting the speakers next to our chairs.

We bought this house when it was in the framing stage, so we had it wired for surround sound when the electricians were here doing "their thing." Wired the family room and master bedroom. We have a Pioneer Elite plasma TV and a Bose sound system. It's pretty awesome. We hear everything.

If your TV is not equipped with bluetooth you can get a fairly inexpensive device to plug into it to make it bluetooth compatible.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00P20TFWM/?tag=hotoge-20

I recently bought a Vizio flat screen TV and I am investigating adding a sound bar. There is one made to fit under the TV between its support legs. There is available a special electrical strip that turns on when the TV is powered up and turns off when the TV is powered down. I can use that to power the sound bar. That eliminates the need to fiddle with a second power switch.

Thank you all. My 2014 Christnas gift was a Bose speaker that I keep permanently next to my iPad for music listening. Absolutely adore it! When I read about sound quality I used to think it was hoohah, but not anymore and def. important.

@debby-ab, we had the most trouble with movie sounds. Unfortunately for now, this will have to stay on my "wish list" as DH says water heater is rumbling and suspects we must replace ASAP, sigh..

I leave the closed captioning on all the time on our tv.

I agree with Debbie....our Samsung sounds great..but our great room is wired for surround sound with a Pioneer elite receiver...Lindsay mentioned...for DVD viewing.

No, we do not have a sound bar on our televisions.

Sue

Our issue was dialog clarity. Due to the setup in our master suite it would have been fairly complicated and expensive to set up all the various angles my DH wanted, since it also includes his being able to see/hear the TV in the next room over (his game room aka the garage). We have friends with good sound systems but it doesn't always help with the 'dialog mumbles', as we call them.

We got this instead (not from this seller, but this specific company/product). It actually works, and we are VERY pleased with it.

The Voice Clarifying TV Speaker: http://www.hammacher.com/Product/84896?promo=search

My significant other recently bought a new tv with a sound bar and it's a big improvement. He's pretty hard of hearing so it's especially helpful. O my home tv my daughter hooked up a Bose sound system which works really well. It was purchased before wireless technology was available but it does a great job anyway. I still use close captioning for a lot of shows where dialogue is important.

How nice to have house wired for electronics. I supposed we could have made holes here and there to accommodate wiring, problem is, technology changes so fast, we'd be tearing stuff every 3-5 yrs. We've chosen to do "roundabout" options instead, sound bar being one example. I keep up with our computer/electronics expenses and about 1/2 of them are for compatibility matters. Believe me, we are not ones to get the latest and greatest--just trying to keep up with a min. expense.

We got our new Samsung TV a year ago then we had to go get Samsung sound bar right away. The sound was terrible on the TV, very tinny. The sound bar has different settings, like Voice or Movie and others. We do use the different audio settings and it does help to hear the TV show, Movie or Music better.

We rarely use the TV speakers. Even though it's connected to a surround sound theater, we prefer wireless headphones like the Sennheiser RS 165. Fabulous sound up to 300' away and we never miss a word or song. The headphones also travel with us.

Don't have one, will either be getting one or returning brand new TV (to Costco). Just bought a Samsung and the sound is awful, really awful. Don't watch much TV, so had not planned on getting a sound bar.

caflowerluver, agree, very tinny.

Plllog is right, allows them to sell TV's flatter and cheaper.

jasdip, thanks, am going to try a set of computer speakers!

I just looked at the options on the Samsung Smart TV and there are several. I choose Movie as sound mode and Dolby Digital as SPDIF output and the TV sounds very good in that configuration. Standard/PCM not so good.

@ brushworks, during the initial set up I tried all the sound choices (movie, voice, etc.) and found none acceptable.

One thing I like about the Samsung is the "on" timer; I have it come on in the AM with the news.

I wished I could use headphones but they hurt my ears. Would be wonderful for when I cant sleep and want to watch tv w/o disturbing DH. But I've never been able to find a comfy enough set. and the ear plugs, ugh! they're even worse for me.

bossy, our headphones are very comfy and they also offer an enhanced comfort cushion model if needed.