Samsung HW-R550 Soundbar Review

The HW-R550 is a budget soundbar system from Samsung's 2019 lineup, but has now been replaced by the 2020 Samsung HW-T550. This 2.1 system setup doesn't have a dedicated center channel like the Samsung HW-R650, but has more speakers than the 2.1 Samsung HW-R450, which came out the same year. These two models are also the R550's main competitors, and it's also compared to some similar budget 2.1 setups like the Yamaha YAS-207.

The Samsung HW-R550 resembles the Samsung HW-R650 a lot. It has a metal grill to cover the front face, but the rest is made of solid plastic. On the right side, there are four buttons to control the soundbar's functions.

The sub is mostly made of wood. The front face is covered with fabric that can get easily dirty or damaged. The port is found on the back.

There are no satellites on this setup.

The Samsung HW-R550 is fairly wide and unlikely to fit between the legs of most 55" TVs. On the upside, it isn't too tall and won't obstruct the lower part of the screen, unless your TV has a very low stand or sits flush on the table.

The subwoofer is almost as big as an average desktop. It connects wirelessly to the system so you can place it anywhere in the room, as long as you can provide it with power.

There are no satellites in this setup.

The back of the bar has two openings for the power cable and the input ports. The wall-mounting holes are on the underside, and the required brackets are included in the box.

The sub's back is plain. The port is made of plastic and is located on the top, while the power cable connects on the bottom, making it easy to hide it.

There are no satellites in this setup.

The Samsung HW-R550 has a great build quality. It's a robust construction that's mostly made of solid plastic and a metal grill on the front face. The sub is made of wood and its weakest point is the fabric on the front of the subwoofer that can get dirty or damaged.

• Remote & batteries
• Bar power cable
• Bar power brick
• Subwoofer power cable
• Optical cable
• Screws & washers
• Wall-mounting brackets & template
• Manuals

The Samsung HW-R550 has a decent stereo frequency response. Its low-frequency extension is slightly high but still better than some higher-end models. Its sound profile is slightly dark, as there’s an overemphasis in the bass range and a lack of detail in the treble range.

When listening to the Samsung HW-R550, the soundstage is just okay. The bar isn’t that wide and the speakers are situated at the extremities of the bar. The R550 doesn’t do any tricks to try widening the soundstage, meaning it’s about as wide as the bar itself. The focus of sounds is fairly good, but due to the dark sound profile, it sounded a bit more diffused than the Samsung HW-R650.

The Samsung HW-R550 can get to a good volume level that will be suitable for a large room or a crowded environment. Also, it performs quite well at max volume and doesn’t produce compression artifacts, which is great.

The Samsung HW-R550's THD performance is good. At a normal listening volume, the amount of THD is within very good limits, which results in a clear and pure sound. However, there’s a noticeable big jump in THD at maximum volume, especially in the bass range and low-mid. However, this might not be audible with real-life content.

The center channel performance of this soundbar is sub-par. It's a 2.1 setup, meaning that it doesn’t have a dedicated center speaker. It uses the left and right speakers to create a sound in the center, which will sound more diffused and less clear compared to a discrete one. The graph shows a pretty dark-sounding profile, but since there’s hardly any bass on the center channel, this shouldn’t affect the performance too much. Voices will still sound fairly clear and accurate.

The Samsung HW-R550 is a 2.1 setup, so it'll downmix surround content and will also sound very dark and bass-heavy. This soundbar can only use its left and right speakers, which won’t do an accurate and clear representation of surround objects in the soundstage. This means the result won't be very immersive and the objects will be perceived to come from the front instead of to your sides or behind you.

The Samsung HW-R550 doesn’t have height channels and doesn’t support Atmos.

Update 06/16/2020: The HW-R550 supports surround sound content, but we had previously listed 'Surround Level Adjustment' to 'N/A'. The test result has now been set to 'No', which has slightly decreased the scoring.

The Samsung HW-R550's sound enhancement features are good. It lacks room correction, so it might sound different depending on your room. On the upside, it has a dialogue enhancement feature to make voices and dialogue in movies clearer. Also, you have a dynamic range control, which is the night mode, and can be enabled/disabled by holding down the sound mode button on the remote for a few seconds. However, this is only available with Dolby Digital tracks. You also get a 7-band EQ and a woofer adjustment level to control the amount of bass produced.

The Samsung HW-R550 can accept several types of inputs to accommodate almost every need. The Analog Audio In can be handy for older devices that only have audio out ports, whereas the Optical Audio In can be helpful with older TVs. Thanks to the Full HDMI In and the HDMI ARC port, you can place the bar in between an external device and the TV and obtain the best visual and audio experience. If you want to listen to music from a USB key, you have to use an adapter as the available port is micro-USB.

This setup can playback Dolby Digital and DTS over ARC although it downmixes it to 2.1. Dolby Digital is widely used in streaming platforms like Netflix and Blu-rays. DTS is rarely found on its own. It's mainly found as the fallback of the higher quality DTS-HD MA widely available in Blu-rays.

When your external device is connected to the Full HDMI in port, this bar will downmix Dolby Digital and DTS sound formats to 2.1. Unfortunately, the higher end object-based sound formats, like Dolby Atmos, or the lossless ones like 5.1 PCM are not supported, so you can't enjoy the highest-fidelity sound experience.

Through Optical, both Dolby Digital and DTS are supported but downmixed to 2.1 due to the bar's design. You can find Dolby Digital content in almost all streaming platforms, and most Blu-rays. DTS is usually found as the fallback of the DTS-HD MA which is found on most recent Blu-rays.

Just like the Samsung HW-R650, you can enjoy your music on your phone or tablet wirelessly through Bluetooth. Unfortunately, you can’t connect to WiFi or cast using Chromecast built-in or AirPlay.

Thanks to the Full HDMI In and the HDMI ARC ports you can pass through a video signal. However, the HW-R550 can't pass through a 4k @ 60Hz video even if both your TV and PC support it.

The subwoofer connects wirelessly to the bar and all you have is the power cable.

There are no satellites on this setup.

There's a small screen behind the grill that serves as the interface. It can display the input source and the volume level and sometimes has to scroll to display the entire message.

The four buttons on the right side of the bar control the volume, the input source selection, and can power the bar on and off.

The Samsung HW-R550's remote is the same as the Samsung HW-R650's remote. It allows you to control all the settings of the soundbar. A message on the interface screen confirms your actions.

The Samsung Audio Remote is the app that pairs with this bar. However, it can't completely replace the remote as it's lacking the 'Settings' and 'Bluetooth' buttons. On the upside, it has great functionality and you can cast files from your phone to the bar.

After 5 minutes of inactivity, the Samsung HW-R550 will switch off thanks to its Auto-Off feature. Also, due to HDMI CEC, your TV's remote can control some basic functionality of the bar.