Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless  Soundbar Review

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless is similar to the Nakamichi DRAGON in both size and design. It's a large, angled soundbar that'll take up a lot more surface area on a TV stand than the average soundbar. It employs a similar monochromatic, brutalist design to the DRAGON with a subtly arched front panel and perforated metal grilles covering the drivers. There are larger grilles at the back of the bar to help with heat dissipation and a selection of inputs located on the underside. While the overall aesthetic is toned down compared to the DRAGON, it's still a very eye-catching bar. 

This unit comes with a pair of ported, modern-looking subwoofers with built-in downward-firing drivers. They're made of a dense plastic, with a slightly brushed exterior that sets them apart from the other components.

The satellites are similarly bulky and feature a perforated metal grille that covers almost the entire body, including the drivers.

While it's not as wide as the Nakamichi DRAGON, this bar is deeper and a little taller. Needless to say, it takes up quite a bit of real estate on a TV stand or table. Its height also means you'll need to ensure your TV legs are tall enough to guarantee a good view of the display or to prevent the bar from blocking the IR receiver of your TV. Depending on your setup, you might be better off mounting your display.  

The subwoofer is among the largest we've tested, similar in size to mid-sized Bluetooth party speakers like the JBL PartyBox 110. The stock configuration ships with two 10-inch (25.4 cm) subwoofers, and unlike the Nakamichi DRAGON, there isn't the option to expand to four.

The satellite speakers are hexagonal in shape. They're similarly bulky to the rest of the setup, so if you lack suitable surfaces to place them on, you may need to purchase a mounting kit.

While both the bar and the satellites are mountable to walls or stands, you'll need to purchase these separately from the manufacturer's website.

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless has a great build quality. The whole kit uses mostly metal and dense plastic, which contributes to both its hefty weight and sturdy feel. Generally, the Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless opts for covered drivers, in contrast to the Nakamichi DRAGON's exposed driver design. As a result, much of the bar, sub, and satellites are covered in a perforated metal grille that gives it a more uniform look and gives the drivers some protection from dust. The bar sits on soft rubber feet to lift it from whatever surface it sits on, while the subwoofers are elevated by a few inches off the ground to accommodate the downward-firing drivers.

• App connection guide
• Firmware update guide
• Manual
• Remote (Batteries Included)
• 4x power cables (Surround/Subs) 3m/10ft
• Main unit power cable 1.5 m / 5ft
• Main unit power adapter 1.5 m / 5ft
• 2x HDMI cable 2 m / 6.5ft
• USB key with initial firmware update.

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless has a good stereo frequency response. The dual subs deliver intense low rumble to the soundbar's bass, though it's not even throughout the range, with a dip in the mid- and high-bass, which weakens the bar's boominess. Meanwhile, the mid-range is more even-sounding with fewer drastic peaks and dips than the bass range. Still, in tracks like Sonique's It Feels So Good, the anthemic vocal line and trance stabs occasionally play second fiddle to the sub-bass frequencies, though the dips in the high-bass can cause the punch to seem soft on kicks. The de-emphasized treble range reproduces a somewhat veiled vocal articulation, so shakers and cymbals are pushed back in the mix. If you find your ears fatigue from bright mixes, the slightly subdued high frequencies with this tuning may appeal.

We tested it using the 'Music 1' preset in 'All Channel Stereo' mode. While this yielded the most balanced results, it also caused audio to play back from every channel. In the absence of an automatic room correction, we also completed the manual room calibration process before testing and followed the placement instructions. We've revisited our initial results and chosen to break our usual out-of-the-box testing protocol to make small adjustments based on the manufacturer's feedback because this better reflects how we expect owners to use this soundbar. These additional tweaks included changing the Low Frequency Effect to -1 dB (out of a range of 0 dB to -12 dB) and setting the crossover to 130Hz (rather than 180Hz by default).

In our testing room, the Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless required no additional adjustments outside of the initial manual room correction described in the Stereo Frequency Response section. By default, the bass is '7' and the treble is '5.'

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless has a good stereo soundstage performance. The soundstage extends almost to the extremities of the bar, with a faint echo around the edge of the bar and satellites, though this doesn't do much to increase the sense of width. There's good focus across the bar, with no audible holes in the stereo image. This isn't always the case when sound stretches to the surrounds, though, as there's some treble-range roll-off as the sound pans hard left or right.

It's worth noting that using 'All Channel Stereo' mode causes audio to play back across every channel, rather than just the main soundbar's drivers, with the intention of widening the soundstage. However, this all-channel playback can also interfere with how voices are placed within the stereo image, making it harder to pinpoint exactly where they're coming from. While vocal placement is less of an issue with regular 'Stereo' mode, we found that it sounded boxy and lacking in focus by comparison.

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless has a superb stereo dynamics performance. It can get extremely loud without compressing very much, which is great if you want to preserve the intricacies of your music, even at high volumes. That said, we couldn't get it to reach the advertised 120 dB max volume, achieving slightly over 110 dB instead. In all, that's plenty loud for most people's needs.

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless has great center channel performance. For this test, we used the 'Movie 1' preset in 'Native' mode with Low Frequency Effect at -1 dB and crossover adjusted to 130Hz. These settings lend the mid-range a clearer emphasis to cut through without sounding muddy. Dialogue has great tracking, allowing you to pinpoint voices within the sound field.

We tested the Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless' surrounds performance using the 'Movie 1' preset in 'Native' mode with Low Frequency Effect at -1 dB and crossover at 130Hz, as we found these were the most natural sounding settings. With these settings, the discrete satellite speakers do an impressive job of accurately playing back surround sound content from all around you, with solid tracking through the range. That said, there's a dip in the low-mids that can cause voices and melodic instrumentals to sound thin and overwhelmed by the boosted bass and relatively excited treble.

During the testing process, we experimented with other surround settings, but found that 'Dolby Surround' was too digital and processed, while 'Studio' was artificially narrow.

As with our surrounds and center testing, we found that 'Movie 1' and 'Native' with Low Frequency Effect at -1 dB and crossover at 130Hz was the setting combination that brought out the best height response. While we tried all three of the Adaptive Height Dispersion (AHD) settings, our test results were achieved with AHD disabled, as we found it pushed the sound too overwhelmingly to the surrounds and would sound artificial at times. Furthermore, Nakamichi states that leaving AHD disabled "delivers height performance as intended by the movie director." That's not to say these settings aren't useful, though, as we noticed that the 'Focal' mode centered height sounds, while 'Wide' spreads them further towards the surrounds. 'Ultra' balances the two, trying to enhance the experience by playing content louder and using a wider range above your head.

Overall, Atmos content sounds immersive, with plenty of rumble and punch in scenes that are rife with explosions, flying debris, and engine growl. Although dialogue can sometimes get a little buried in the mix, trebly metallic clinks sound detailed without verging on piercing. Tracking of vertical objects isn't exactly pinpoint, but they'll reach a height of a foot or two overhead, like the detailed sound of a giant monster's breath above you. Objects moving from the rear satellites towards the front do so smoothly without major holes, indicating a decent balance between the satellites and bar. Additionally, if you're looking for a more balanced, less bassy Atmos experience out of the box, check out the LG S95AR.

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless has a fair few sound customization and enhancement features that are very much geared towards advanced users who enjoy tinkering. There's no automatic room correction, for example, though a more advanced room calibration feature lets you plug in your room dimensions to optimize the sound for your space. Additional advanced settings include crossover frequency, Low Frequency Effect, sub strength, outer/inner surround level, and per-channel output level.

As with the Nakamichi DRAGON, you have a range of DSP presets to toggle between, including 'Music' and 'Movie' (each with a range of three presets 1–3), 'Game,' 'News,' and 'Sports.' You can also choose between two different stereo modes: 'All Channel Stereo' and 'Stereo,' as well as three different surround modes: 'Dolby Surround,' 'Studio,' and 'Native.' There's an adjustable night mode for those with concerns for their neighbors, as well as a few Adaptive Height Dispersion (AHD) settings. The latter lets you cycle through presets that alter the perception of height with Atmos content. While there's no dialogue enhancement mode, we found that the 'News' preset naturally accentuated voices.

There are plenty of inputs, all of which are located in a crevice on the underside of the bar. There's an HDMI eARC port, two full HDMI In ports, an optical port, and a 3.5 mm input you can use to connect devices via an AUX cord. There's also HDMI 2.1 support for high-resolution signals. Finally, there's a USB port that's used only for firmware upgrades. Curiously, the bar was delivered with a USB key and instructions for updating the soundbar before initial use. The supposed rationale behind this was to ship all units before tariffs kicked in, meaning there was little time to individually install firmware updates on every unit.

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless has incredible format support. Just about every major audio format is supported, including DTS and Dolby Digital, as well as object-based formats like Dolby Atmos and DTS:X. Unlike the DRAGON, however, there's no support for DTS:X Pro.

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless has outstanding format support via HDMI In. It supports all major audio formats, so you'll have no trouble playing back audio from your favorite Blu-rays or streaming platforms.

There's support for both Dolby Digital and DTS, as well as PCM playback via the optical port.

Latency via an eARC connection is great. Latency is pretty low across every audio format, so it's unlikely you'll experience any syncing issues between your audio and video. If you do, you can always manually adjust for any delay with the 'Lip Sync' function, accessible through the remote. That said, latency can vary somewhat across different setups. 

Latency using the HDMI In port is very good and fairly low across all audio formats. You can always manually adjust for any AV desync issues with the 'Lip Sync' function, accessible through the remote. That said, latency can vary somewhat across different setups. 

Optical latency is disappointing. Latency is high when playing back PCM 2-channel audio and even higher when using Dolby Digital. You'll likely have to make some adjustments using the 'Lip Sync' function to ensure your audio and video are in sync.

This soundbar supports HDMI 2.1 and can passthrough 4k signals @ 120Hz @ 10-bit. It also features two HDMI In ports, giving you many options when it comes to using the bar as a hub between different devices and displays. 

This soundbar has some limited wireless playback options. It has Bluetooth compatibility, as well as compatibility with Apple AirPlay, but there's no support for other wireless interfaces, like Google Chromecast or Wi-Fi.

There's a dot-matrix display at the front of the soundbar that's capable of conveying a surprising amount of detail. It shows when you change the audio format and your current input selection, scrolling through the full details when you press the 'Stop' button on the remote.

There are a few controls on the top panel of the bar that let you change a handful of parameters. The five buttons let you power on/off, switch the input, increase/decrease the volume, and enter demo mode.

The Nakamichi Shockwafe Wireless comes with a large, well-featured remote that lets you tweak advanced parameters and settings. There's also the Nakamichi Remote app, which you can use to adjust the same settings from the comfort of your smartphone or mobile device. 

This soundbar doesn't feature any built-in voice assistant support, so it relies on the capabilities of your Alexa or Google Assistant-compatible device for voice commands.