Sony HT-X9000F  Soundbar Review

The Sony HT-X9000F has a slightly angled, sleek black design. The bar is made from good quality plastic and it has a long metal grill on its front, which gives it a premium look and feel.

The subwoofer's case is made from black melamine. Its front face has a glossy finish and there's a nice metal grille to cover the woofer. The back is covered with a metal plate as well.

There are no satellites in this soundbar setup.

This bar is fairly wide. Although it's slightly angled to fit between the Sony X900F legs, it probably won't be the right fit for most 55" TVs. On the upside, the soundbar isn't too tall, so it's unlikely to block the bottom of your screen unless your TV sits flush on the table.

The subwoofer of the Sony HT-X9000F is about the size of a desktop computer. It can be placed next to your couch or TV stand.

There are no satellites in this setup.

The back of the Sony HT-X9000F has two openings. The one on the left is for the integrated power cable. The opening on the right side has all the input ports. Unfortunately, it doesn't come with mounting brackets or screws, so if you want to put this on your wall, you'll need to purchase these accessories separately.

The back of the Sony HT-X9000F is very simple. It's made of black metal and it only has an integrated cable at the bottom.

This setup doesn't have any satellites.

The Sony HT-X9000F has a good build quality. Its metal grill has a nice silver lining at its base while the rest of its body is made from a sleek, black plastic. The subwoofer also has a nice feel to it as its front has a glossy finish and the woofer is covered with a metal grille. It feels sturdy as its casing is made from melamine and the back is covered in a black metal plate.

• Manuals
• Remote
• 2x AAA batteries for its remote
• HDMI cable

The Sony HT-X9000F has an okay stereo frequency response when tested on Standard mode. Even with its subwoofer, it struggles to produce a thumpy, punchy bass, and it sounds boxy and bright. While this preset may not be well-suited for bass-heavy music like EDM or fast-paced action flicks, it's still suited for more voice-oriented content such as audiobooks. That being said, there are six other presets available, each of which may be better suited for your audio needs.

The stereo soundstage of the Sony HT-X9000F is just passable. It's about as wide as the bar itself, and the bar doesn't do any tricks to help widen it. While the soundstage sounds decently focused, it still seems a bit diffused, which makes objects sound like they're coming from more general areas rather than precise, accurate locations. The focus may also be perceived as moving slowly in space, and a sound may stay too long on either side of the bar before moving, which could potentially affect immersion into your favorite films or games.

Update 09/22/2020: We've discovered a value input bug that would cause the Dynamics box results to be slightly off. All soundbars reviewed since January 30th, 2020 have been updated.

The Sony HT-X9000F has satisfactory stereo dynamics. While it can get loud enough for a large room or a crowded party, there's a lot of pumping and compression artifacts at max volume, especially in the bass range.

The Sony HT-X9000F has a great THD performance. At a normal volume, it produces clear and pure sound. While there's a slight jump in the bass range when listening at max volume, it shouldn't be audible to most people, especially with real-life content.

The Sony HT-X9000F is a 2.1 channel soundbar, and it doesn't have a dedicated center speaker. Instead, it uses its left and right speakers to simulate a sound in the center, and as a result, it sounds more diffused and less clear than a discrete center. That being said, its center channel performance is passable. Although its tonal balance is neutral overall, some voices on this bar sound a little weak while others may be more piercing. They still sound fairly clear and accurate though.

The Sony HT-X9000F is a 2.1 channel setup, so it downmixes surround content to stereo, producing an experience that doesn't feel as real as discrete tower speakers as surround objects aren't accurately or clearly represented. It has a somewhat excited, v-shaped sound profile, which means that it has an emphasis on bass and treble sounds. Like many other Sonys, it also has an always-on surround sound mode.

This 2.1 soundbar supports Atmos, although it has to downmix it into stereo to play it. It also uses Sony's Vertical Surround Engine to simulate an Atmos experience. It's not as immersive as soundbars with upward-firing speakers or dedicated satellites such as the Nakamichi Shockwafe Ultra 9.2Ch, though, and it lacks a lot of bass.

The Sony HT-X9000F has sub-par sound enhancement features. It lacks room correction, so your soundbar could sound differently depending on which room you've set it in. Luckily, there are seven EQ presets to help give you the best sound possible: Standard, Auto Sound, Cinema, Music, Game Studio, News, and Sports. Similar to the Sony HT-S200F, there's an S-Force Pro surround sound feature that can't be turned off. There's also a Vertical Surround Engine feature, which is supposed to simulate an Atmos experience, and this can be turned on/off.

This soundbar has quite a few inputs. There's an Optical Audio In as well as an HDMI ARC. There's also a Full HDMI In so that you can connect it to external devices like a gaming console. There's even a USB port so that you can play music directly from your thumb drive. Unlike the Sony HT-X8500, it also has an analog Audio In port, so you can play music from older devices.

The Sony HT-X9000F can play all standard surround formats thanks to its HDMI ARC port. As it also has eARC, it can play object-based surround signals as well as lossless formats.

The Sony HT-X9000F has a full HDMI In port, so it supports all the same formats as its HDMI ARC port.

The Sony-HT-X9000F supports both Dolby Digital and DTS content via its Optical Audio In. This content is usually found on Blu-ray discs as well as streaming platforms such as Netflix.

Like many other Sony soundbars, its wireless playback options are mediocre. You can only connect it via Bluetooth, which is handy if you're streaming music from your smartphone or tablet, but the lack of Wi-Fi support is a little disappointing.

If you have devices connected to your soundbar, you can pass through the highest quality signals without a problem. It supports 4:4:4 too so that when you're using your PC, the text remains clear and easy to read on your TV.

The Sony HT-X9000F's subwoofer has an integrated power cable, so it can't be removed. The subwoofer connects wirelessly to the soundbar.

There are no satellites in this setup.

The interface of the Sony HT-X9000F consists of five lights on the top-front of the bar. They light up to tell you what setting you're on. When using the HDMI In cable, you can see the menu on your TV screen.

This bar has touch-sensitive controls located on its top. You can turn the bar on/off, switch to a Bluetooth connection, change wired inputs, and raise/lower the volume.

The Sony HT-X9000F has a remote that allows you to control all of the soundbar's settings.

This soundbar doesn't have a companion app.

The Sony HT-X9000F enters 'Standby' mode after 20 minutes of inactivity. It also supports CEC, so you can use your TV's remote to control this soundbar.