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- Potent and impactful sound
- Remarkably immersive surround sound
- Excellent connectivity
- Premium price
- Very much not a one-bar solution
- Sub sometimes needs tweaking for music
Good news! This expensive soundbar just got cheaper
It might be Prime Day, but you don't always have to be a Prime subscriber to enjoy a deep discount. The Samsung HW-Q990F reviewed here is on offer for £1,154, no Prime membership required – that's an all-time low price for this excellent soundbar & speaker combo, and the first discount it's seen since launch.
£1154 1699
Non-Prime deal
Samsung’s flagship soundbars have been major critical and commercial hits for years now. As a result, Samsung’s soundbar division has understandably played it quite safe with them of late, making only relatively small tweaks here and minor adjustments there for each annual refresh.
The Samsung HW-Q990F jettisons this pragmatic conservatism. One of its most important elements – its external subwoofer – has undergone a quite radical transformation. The question is, does this bass speaker redesign benefit the system’s sound quality, or will it turn out to be an unfortunate case of style trumping substance?
What you need to know
The HW-Q990F follows the same core formula as its predecessors (the HW-Q990B, HW-Q990C and HW-Q990D) by delivering an 11.1.4-channel count from a system of four separate wireless components.
The intention behind all these channels and speakers is to create a full surround sound experience, complete with overhead effects, from a startlingly compact speaker system.
AV fans won’t be surprised to learn that the HW-Q990F system can decode and play both the Dolby Atmos and DTS:X sound formats, which represent the state of the art in home cinema sound.
Price and competition
At £1,699, the HW-Q990F sits towards the premium end of the soundbar world. Not right at the top; there are speciality designs from a few high-end hi-fi companies that push upwards of £2,000. But it’s far beyond the sort of £700 to £1000 level where many popular soundbars, including the Sonos Arc Ultra, hang out.
The Q990F does have a lot going on, though, with its huge channel count and inclusion of four powerful separate components. Once you’ve experienced the immersive effect of all these channels and speakers, the price doesn’t look unreasonable at all.
The closest rivals for the Q990F are the 9.1.5-channel LG US95TR, which has unusual dual front and up-firing centre channels and costs £1,449, and the JBL Bar 1300. The latter joins the HW-Q990F in offering 11.1.4 channels, but its battery-powered rear speakers need to be attached to the main bar for recharging. The Bar 1300 is currently available for as little as £899, as it’s set to be replaced by a much more powerful successor.
Design and features
While three parts of the Q990F’s four-piece system will look very familiar to anyone who’s seen one of Samsung’s flagship soundbars over the past few years, the subwoofer has received wholesale changes to both its shape and speaker configuration.
Its 249 x 249 x 252mm (WDH) shape switches from an upright tower to a more compact cube, while the previous single large side-mounted driver has been replaced with two substantial active drivers sitting opposite each other on two of the cube’s sides. The sub has nicely rounded edges and a crisp matte finish, while the new driver design is claimed to disperse bass tones more widely and smoothly, and distort less.
The soundbar itself measures 1,232 x 138 x 71mm (WDH), making it a substantial thing to tuck under your TV screen. It’s slim enough not to protrude over the screen of most modern TV designs, though, and the combination of its double-angled ends and striking finish adds some style to its otherwise rather industrial approach.
The rear speakers are very similar to those that came with previous Samsung flagship soundbars, too. The front, outer side and top edges of their compact 130 x 140 x 201mm (WDH) all feature attractive grilled finishes, while their inner edges enjoy a nice gloss finish – all in the same colour scheme as the other components.
The 23 drivers tucked inside the Q990F’s various components are the soundbar’s star attraction. The 11.1.4-channel arrangement breaks down as follows: front centre, front left, front right, forward side left, forward side right, left and right sides and two up-firing drivers in the main bar component; forward, outer side and up-firing drivers in each rear speaker, and the .1 bass channel delivered by the soundbar. This bass input still counts as just a single channel, despite now being produced by two drivers.
If you want to add even more speakers to the setup, Samsung’s Q Symphony allows the soundbar to work in conjunction with one of the brand’s compatible TVs, such as the Samsung S95F or Samsung QN90F, to create a larger and more detailed soundstage.
More Samsung synergy comes with the Q990F’s ability to receive Dolby Atmos soundtracks wirelessly from recent premium Samsung TVs, as well as the ability to control the soundbar using a Samsung TV remote.
The wireless rears can be grouped by themselves to become standalone stereo speakers that could even be used in a separate room if you wish, or they can turn into the only speakers the system uses for a relatively quiet personal listening session if you select the soundbar’s Night mode.
While the Q990F allows you to manually adjust the balance of each of its many channels, it also sports a Space Fit Pro auto calibration system that can analyse the system’s sound and tweak the balance of different channels automatically. An AI-boosted Active Bass Control system also continually monitors the input from the new subwoofer to try and limit the chance of it distorting or becoming either too dominant or too lightweight in the overall mix.
The Q990F incorporates a helpful suite of audio presets, including modes for remixing stereo music tracks to take advantage of the system’s full channel count, and a Game Pro mode that exaggerates the direction of sounds in a surround mix to make it easier to detect the directions enemies might be approaching or attacking from.
Connections and control
The HW-Q990F is one of the best-connected soundbars around. Crucially, it provides a two-in, one-out HDMI passthrough system capable of passing 4K/120Hz signals to your TV or projector. Surprisingly few soundbars support such signals despite them now being commonplace from the Xbox Series X, PlayStation 5 and PCs.
The Q990F’s HDMI passthrough also goes further than many other soundbars by supporting both the Dolby Vision and HDR10+ premium HDR formats. This means the soundbar can pass on the best format of any HDR source it receives, assuming your TV can support the same formats. Ironically, Samsung still refuses to support Dolby Vision on its TVs.
A digital optical audio input is also provided for sources that don’t require the bandwidth delivered by HDMI, and you’ve got plenty of wireless connection options available, too. Owners of relatively recent Samsung phones can, for instance, establish a content sharing connection with a Q990F simply by tapping the phone against the main soundbar’s bodywork. There’s also support for regular Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connections, including direct compatibility with GoogleCast, Apple AirPlay, and the Tidal Connect and Spotify streaming systems.
You can control the HW-Q990F in no less than four different ways, the most obvious of which is the elegant remote control. There is also a set of touch-sensitive control buttons on the soundbar’s top edge and support for voice controls if you’re comfortable with talking to inanimate objects.
Probably the best way of controlling the Q990F, though, is via Samsung’s Smart Things app on your mobile phone or tablet. Old connection bugs with the app seem to have been ironed out, while the app’s OSD presentation and functionality have also been improved.
One last small but very useful point to add in this section is the LED display on the soundbar’s front edge, which enables you to properly track incoming sound formats, volume levels, selected inputs and so on.
Sound quality
Samsung’s soundbars typically thrive on heavy, hard-hitting film soundtracks that catch most other soundbars out – so I went straight to my favourite collection of such speaker-melting movie moments to see if I could humble the HW-Q990F’s new subwoofer. Even Hollywood’s best efforts ended in abject failure, though, as the Q990F took everything in its stride even more easily than its already class-leading predecessor.
The new dual-driver subwoofer turns out to be at least as effective for films as the previous design was. It reaches the same exceptionally low frequency depths without starting to sound compressed or as if it’s coming up hard against any sort of bass floor. Even the lowest frequencies are propelled forth at high volumes without the new drivers sounding strained, and without the bass starting to sound too droney or detached from the main soundbar.
It’s perhaps not quite as nimble and varied with the bass frequencies it pumps out as its predecessor, but its crossover with the rest of the system’s sound remains outstanding. It slightly improves on the previous design in a couple of ways, too. First, the dual-driver arrangement disperses rumbles around your room more effectively, making them sound even more non-directional and natural. Second, while the previous subwoofer design never sounded actively harsh, there’s a smoother, more rounded tone to the new one that makes the bass blending process even slicker.
While Samsung’s Space Fit Pro auto-calibration system didn’t deliver perfect results, leaving me feeling the need to nudge the balance of the rear speakers up slightly, it does an excellent job of keeping the new subwoofer in harmony with the rest of the system’s sound.
The other speakers in the system all deliver their familiar combination of power, projection, uncannily accurate channel steering and precise sound effect placement. The result is an incredibly rich three-dimensional sound space that wraps right around you and articulates overhead effects convincingly.
No other soundbar I’ve heard does a more effective job of developing a varying sense of scale when switching between a tight interior sequence to a large outdoor setting. The HW-Q0990F does this while still managing to make you feel like you’re at the heart of the action, and the dome of sound it creates remains seamless at all times.
Some of the Q990F’s extreme power is used to ensure that even the smallest sound effect is reproduced, so no part of a mixer’s art goes unnoticed. But at the same time, no effect is over-emphasised, ensuring that the soundstage always sounds coherent.
While the Q990F is at its scenery-chewing best with film soundtracks, it’s no slouch as a music performer, either. It’s particularly good with Dolby Atmos music tracks able to take the fullest and most natural advantage of its huge channel count, but it also plays stereo music with an excellent combination of power and staging. Left and right channel separation is delivered convincingly without being over-egged, vocals are locked in the centre of the mix, and different track layers are delivered with clarity without ever becoming too clinical.
Even the Adaptive Sound and Surround settings that use processing to remix stereo music into the system’s full speaker setup typically sound compelling and convincing. Purists still won’t fancy them, but I’d recommend that most users at least give the Adaptive Sound option a couple of trial spins.
My only complaint about the Q990F’s sound is that the new subwoofer isn’t quite as successful with music as it is with movies. While its bass is smoother and better dispersed than its predecessor’s and handles typical pop tracks brilliantly, it can sound a touch laboured with tracks that feature a fast or hard beat. I also found myself manually tweaking its relative volume level a few times during my music testing to adapt it to different types of music, indicating that the automated bass management systems aren’t quite as clever with music as they are with films.
While these issues are noteworthy compared with the HW-Q990D, I can’t stress enough that they don’t come close to stopping the Q990F from still sounding spectacularly good with music compared with the vast majority of other soundbars. And it’s in a class of its own with films.
Verdict
Worries that the new subwoofer design of Samsung’s latest flagship soundbar may be motivated more by aesthetic than sound quality concerns prove gloriously unfounded. In most ways, it improves the soundbar’s overall performance, particularly with films, and while the other speakers don’t reinvent the wheel, they didn’t need to.
By still delivering the most complete and immersive dome of sound in the soundbar world while embracing the new subwoofer as if they’ve all been hanging out together for years, the HW-Q990F becomes yet another Samsung soundbar superstar.
