Aperion Audio SLIMstage30 Soundbar Review

SLIMstage30 Build Quality

Regardless of how much we love our dedicated home theaters, there are plenty of people out there that just want a small solution. They don't have the room or the desire to set up a full system but they still want a surround sound like experience. This sort of customer has a number of different needs for setup including multiple different on-wall placements and on shelf. Manufacturers have to account for all these different needs with their offerings. Aperion Audio has long been associated with quality speakers and subwoofers. When they wanted a surroundbar option, they decided to partner with Soundmatters. Soundmatters has been offering their surroundbar for a while now but with the addition of  one of Aperion Audio's subs, you're looking at package that's got a lot of people interested.

Build Quality

I've received a lot of gear in a lot of different packaging but rarely have I seen anything as well packed as the Soundmatters SLIMstage30. The surroundbar is double boxed with a full layer of foam all the way around it and encased in a canvas bag. There are four unlabeled boxes that contain such accessories as cables, power supply, remote, and wall mounts. All of this is packaged so tightly and so securely that I have to believe that somebody spent more than a few hours on CAD working it out. The packing on the SLIMstage30 was truly impressive.

The Bravus 8A subwoofer was slightly less well packed in that it had open handholds on the side of the box. While the sub was protected from the elements by a plastic bag, the delivery driver managed to rip the cardboard nearly up to the top of the box. Inside, however, the Bravus 8A had foam bottom and top caps and a ring of cardboard around the center for protection. Inside the plastic bag the sub was wrapped in blue and purple velvet bag reminiscent of capes I... I mean those DnD nerds in high school used to wear. I kept waiting for the sub to cast fireball at me.

Taking a closer look at the SLIMstage30, you notice that there are convex rubber feet on the bottom, gloss black endcaps, and nearly wall to wall grill (with drivers/passive radiators pointing in nearly every direction). On the front there are a few controls including Mute, Source, and Volume up and down. There is a readout for power (green light) and surround mode (blue lights – one to three for light to heavy surround). There is a digital display on the front for control and setup. The overall look of the SLIMstage30 is very sleek and high tech.

The back of the unit has a number of inputs and outputs under a removable cover. There are 3.5mm jacks for subwoofer and rear speaker outputs, plus two analogue inputs. There are two optical digital inputs and one coaxial input for multichannel audio. Next to this panel is another smaller area that has a service connection, serial IR, and the power port. Unlike most audio gear, the SLIMstage30 gets power from a laptop-like power supply. The advantage of this is that it will work with most any country's power, the downside is that you have a huge power block to deal with. 

As mentioned, the feet on the SLIMstage30 are convex which means they rock. I was a little perplexed by this until I found the small stands. The feet have indentations on them that allow you to lock them into the stands for aiming them at your listening position. The wall bracket has an aiming system as well so that you can position the SLIMstage30 above or below your display.

The Bravus 8A sub is a smallish (15" H x 13.5" W x 13.5" D) and light (33lbs) but you shouldn't misconstrue that to mean that it is in anyway not a “real” sub. We've seen so many surroundbars packed with “bass modules” that it is jarring to see a real sub in a package. The look of the sub is impeccable with a gloss black finish. Of course, don't touch it without a microfiber cloth nearby as it picks up fingerprints like crazy. There are two foot options with Bravus – both look like spikes. The fatter of the two spikes are actually rubberized and can be used on hardwood and tile. Then thinner spikes are made out of metal and are designed for carpets. Aperion, anticipating every possible consumer want, included small stands for those that want to use the metal spikes on hardwood/tile. The stands are the diameter of a dime with a small indentation in the center. On the opposite side there is a rubber pad so to not mar the surface of your floor.

The back of the sub has all the normal controls you'd expect with a removable power cord, variable volume and crossover, and phase and on/off/standby switches. The nice part is that the SLIMstage30 has a variable phase control included. While it is not likely something that a casual user will know what to do with, an enthusiast would. Of course, an enthusiast probably wouldn't have a surroundbar solution in the first place but... whatever. The sub has a downfiring 8" driver with a downfiring port. On medium pile or plusher carpets, you're probably going to run into a problem with the clearance of this sub. I have medium pile and found that at full extension the carpet would probably get in the way if I screwed in the spikes as far as they'd go. I had to back them out about half way before I was sure the driver wouldn't touch the carpet.

Opening up the sub we find that the Bravus 8A is constructed out of 3/4” HDF. The driver is a heavy 8” aluminum cone with an oversized magnet and large surround. The basket looks stamped but is hearty and robust looking. There are three braces in the sub though the diagonal one is just attached to the wall along the long side and not at the ends. The other two braces are connected at the ends into cutouts. The knock test sounds very dead for a sub included with a surroundbar (or any sub for that matter). There is a large piece of polyfil included within the box.

SLIMstage30 Setup and Remote Control

I set up the SLIMstage30 on top of my Sanus DFV49 TV stand and connected it directly to a Denon DVD-3910. I used the included wires (which, I might add, were very high quality) and foot stands. I sat about 8 feet away from the speaker in a home theater room that had been treated with DIY room treatments and GIK Tri-Traps and optimized through the Auralex Room Analysis Plus process.

You probably won't need the manual or quick connection guide except for making the sub connection. The subwoofer and analogue inputs/outputs are all 3.5mm. They provide a single 3.5mm to 3.5mm cable and 3.5mm to RCA cable but you could need up to four of these. For the sub, if you are using the included cable, you'll want to connect the white RCA into the LFE input on the sub. After plugging everything in, I switched on the unit. The display is plenty bright (you can turn it off/have it dim after use from the menu) and it is very easy to read the standard readout of volume and (to a lesser extent) input from my seated position. The interior setup menus, however, are WAY too small to see from 8 feet away. For those, you'll need to get right up on it.

The menu system is fairly straightforward and basic so you won't be visiting it very often. Basically, you need to make sure that the sub is selected and set the distance from the SLIMstage30 (over or under 2 meters are your only options – someone right at 2 meters has to move their chair I guess). The sub crossover will already be set to the recommended 110Hz, the language to English, and the EQ to flat. There are a few other advanced settings that you might want to play with (default input, default mode, adjusting the 10 band EQ, etc.) but most of these you can access from the remote.

Missing from the setup menu was any sort of test tone or auto-calibration. In the case of a $600 soundbar, I'd expect one or the other. As it is, you can increase or decrease the amount of bass, move the surround left and right, increase the amount of surround effects (via the different modes), and increase and decrease the volume of the surround effects on the fly. Calibration, without some sort of extra disc, will have to be done by ear.

I ran into a few problems with the SLIMstage30 during setup. First, any time I powered on or off the unit the Bravus 8A would thump. In fact, thumping was a regular part of the sub experience as it happened when I accessed my DVD menus or skipped chapters – basically, there was a lot of thumping going on. Next, the SLIMstage30 remote shared more than a few IR commands with my Denon receiver which meant that it was a constant struggle to control one and not the other. This won't be a problem for those that are using the SLIMstage30 as it was intended (without anything other than sources and displays in the room) but it bears mentioning.

Lastly, I ran into a bit of a snag with the subwoofer output – it didn't work. I verified that the cable and the sub worked but when I plugged it in to the SLIMstage30 I got nearly no output (except for the aforementioned thumps). Now, I'm willing to give the SLIMstage30 the benefit of the doubt and say that the thumps and the non-functioning subwoofer output were connected somehow but as a reviewer I need to describe what I experienced. I ended up reviewing the SLIMstage30 and the Bravus 8A as standalone units rather than as a group. There is no reason to think that they wouldn't make a fine pair. Aesthetically, they looked very good together and the small size of the sub plays nicely with the design of the SLIMstage30. One thing that Aperion and Soundmatters might consider for the future is a wireless connection from the bar to the sub. Many consumers would consider this a huge plus especially considering that the type of customer that is looking at a surroundbar is generally limited in sub placement options. Also, while I like the quality of the included cables (plenty thick and well constructed), the choice of white is a little baffling. With everything else being black, they sort of stick out.

Remote

The SLIMstage30 remote is (of course) gloss black with what looked to be backlit buttons. Unfortunately this isn't the case as they are of the "glow-in-the-dark" variety. This means that if they are exposed to a bright light source, they'll glow for a few minutes afterward. There are three main button areas under the power button (which is the largest button and is near the top). The top buttons are round and arranged as if in a keypad orientation (four by three grid, equal size buttons). The first row is to access specific functions such as Night Mode, Dialogue enhancement, and EQ. These are not adjustments (even for the EQ) but simply On/Off toggles. One thing I didn't like was that pressing the button activated the toggle. I'd prefer if the first press displayed the current state and the second toggled to the opposite state.

Below those were controls specifically for headphones and then two rows of input select buttons. The second section of buttons had your standard up/down/left/right with a center button and four buttons at the four corners. Up and down  increased and decreased the bass, right and left increased and decreased the volume. The center button was mute while the top two buttons flipped between the different surround modes (Stereo Bypass, Wide Stereo, Games, and Movie). The blue LEDs on the front of the unit increased in number (up to three) as the amount of surround effect was increased. The bottom two buttons increased and decreased the volume of the surround effects. The third section of buttons were, again, similar in shape and layout but were actually directional for menu navigation and to enter and exit the setup menu.

Overall, the remote felt lightweight but well built. I liked how the buttons were laid out. Even though I couldn't see them in the dark, there was enough separation and enough different sizes that I was able to remember, eventually, most of the major functions I used and their locations. Backlighting would have been nice and the remote was a little small and light overall, but for the form and function of the SLIMstage30, I felt it was a pretty good fit.

SLIMstage30 Listening Tests and Conclusion

As I mentioned, I had a bit of difficulty getting the SLIMstage30 and the Bravus 8A sub to work in concert. As such, I've reviewed the two separately and have no problems saying that they would work well as a unit. The first thing I wanted to do was test the low end response of both units. To do that, I used my trusty Rives Test CD 2. The SLIMstage30 had usable bass output (usable being defined as that I could hear it at my listening position) with the sub switched to “No” in the menu down to between 63 and 80Hz. I say “between” because apparently the resonance frequency of my Sanus DFV49 was around 63Hz so the test tone made it ring like a bell. I was definitely getting good strong output at 80Hz so the recommended crossover at 110Hz might be a bit conservative. If I was a new owner, I'd consider experimenting with a lower crossover.  The Bravus 8A had output down to 31.5Hz which is well below the spec'ed 35Hz. In-room response will do that. What this means is that you have two units that promise to integrate well and give you a very nice, tactile movie experience.

DVD: War of the Worlds
I can't lie and say that I expected much from the SLIMstage30. I've long been an opponent of surroundbars in all but the most extreme of situations (where extreme=divorce or murder). Basically, my attitude towards surround bars has been, "They all suck so you're looking for the least sucky." Fair? No, but that's the way I felt about them. The SLIMstage30 has changed that. From the moment I stuck in War of the Worlds, I was enthralled with how wide and immersive the sound was. While I only rarely (very rarely) ever felt the sound was coming from behind me, I was impressed with the overall width and quality of the front of room sound.

Since I was using the SLIMstage30 without a functioning sub, I was particularly impressed with the amount of bass I was experiencing. While it wasn't bone crushing or teeth jarring by any means, it was tremendously more than you'd ever expect out of your display's speakers. On top of that, the soundstage didn't feel artificial at all. The front of the room sounded like it was full of speakers (well, the front of my room is full of speakers but only the SLIMstage30 was playing). No matter what, using phase (and speakers firing from the top and bottom of the SLIMstage30) isn't ever going to be as good as actually having speakers and the SLIMstage30 is no different. Still, I was quite impressed with the overall sound and quality of the unit.

I plugged the Bravus 8A into my Denon AVR-4310CI and mated it with the RBH TK-5CT tower speakers and Emotiva ERD-1 surrounds. I was impressed immediately with the sound output in my room and the depths that this little sub can plumb. Is it a match for the Axiom EP500 (which normally performs sub duties in my HT)? No. But then again it is a fraction of the price and a fraction of the size. With the SLIMstage30, you are getting the sub for a mere $200 (which a considerably discount from the MSRP of $369) so if you're on the market for a surroundbar, the sub is a no brainer. While I think that as a total solution a wireless connection would have been best, as a standalone sub, the Bravus 8A is very impressive.

DTS DVD: Porcupine Tree: The Incident
While I bought the Porcupine Tree: The Incident for the DVD-A portion, there is a DTS track. One of the nice things about the SLIMstage30 is that it can accept Dobly Digital, DTS, and uncompressed audio. This means that you can connect up your Blu-ray player to it if you want. For this test, I listened to the SLIMstage30 with the DTS 5.1 track and a 24-bit stereo track. For the DTS track I used Movie mode which puts the most information into the surrounds of all the modes and for the stereo track I used Stereo Bypass. The DTS track sounded muddy and confused through the SLIMstage30 with odd moments of the the soundstage collapsing. With the stereo track, the soundstage was wide but the sweetspot was tiny. What this meant was that if you were sitting dead center to the SLIMstage30, the sound was enveloping. If you sat at all off axis, however, it sounded like you were only getting sound into one ear. Obviously, the forte of a surroundbar is movies and TV and this once again rang true with the SLIMstage30.

Conclusion

I'm the guy that loves to hate stuff but in this case, I can't bring myself to hate the SLIMstage30. The price is much more reasonable than the more full featured and capable Yamaha models so it is accessible to a wider range of consumers. The Bravus 8A sub is powerful and capable and the bass response of the SLIMstage30 means that the two will mate well. The sound quality of the SLIMstage30, especially for movies, it impressive and will probably have you shaking your head. The next person that asks me for a surroundbar recommendation and balks at the Yamaha prices will be steered directly toward Aperion. As far as I'm concerned the $799 SLIMstage30/Bravus 8A combo is going to be very hard to beat.

Aperion Audio SLIMStage30
$599 - $799 with Bravus 8A sub

Aperion Audio
18151 SW Boones Ferry Road
Portland, OR 97224
1-888-880-8992
www.aperionaudio.com

About Aperion Audio
Aperion Audio is an online direct-to-consumer speaker manufacturer for smart shoppers who are  frustrated with the retail experience. Aperion offers a better value, meaningful information, generous service, and unlike other speaker retailers and manufacturers, is the only company to deliver an honest and Totally Risk-Free In-Home Audition. For additional information, visit www.aperionaudio.com.

The Score Card

The scoring below is based on each piece of equipment doing the duty it is designed for. The numbers are weighed heavily with respect to the individual cost of each unit, thus giving a rating roughly equal to:

Performance × Price Factor/Value = Rating

Audioholics.com note: The ratings indicated below are based on subjective listening and objective testing of the product in question. The rating scale is based on performance/value ratio. If you notice better performing products in future reviews that have lower numbers in certain areas, be aware that the value factor is most likely the culprit. Other Audioholics reviewers may rate products solely based on performance, and each reviewer has his/her own system for ratings.

Audioholics Rating Scale

• — Excellent
• — Very Good
• — Good
• — Fair
• — Poor

Metric	Rating
Build Quality
Appearance
Treble Extension
Bass Extension
Imaging
Soundstage
Fit and Finish
Performance
Value