Philips TAB5305 Soundbar Review: It’s Best For You.

Philips has launched two new 2.1Ch soundbars in India: the TAB7305 and TAB 5305, which are priced at INR 14,990 and INR 21,990, accordingly. These soundbars will primarily target offline markets and will have a premium design. We have had the modest TAB5305 attached to our TV for the last month and have gathered our thoughts and experience in this review. Let’s go over what we liked and didn’t like.

There is no cable in the box (HDMI, Aux, or optical) that you can use to connect the bar to your TV. The following is what you’ll get inside the Philips TAB5305 box:

The Philips TAB5305 is a sleek and stylish soundbar that works with TVs up to 55 inches in size. It’s 3 feet long and 65 mm tall, which means it won’t block the view of most TVs put on a table or in a cabinet.

The bar seemed to be of high quality, and the build quality was acceptable for the price. We like the blade cube design, and the front has a metal grill. On the top surface, there is Philips branding at the center and rubberized hard buttons (always appreciated) towards the right corner.

Within the bar, there is only one LED indicator that lights up in different colors to represent different controls, inputs, and presets – making it difficult to comprehend. All ports are placed in a back recessed alcove.

The wireless subwoofer, in contrast to the bar, is quite basic. Its dimensions are approximately 150 x 225 x 267 mm, with one-inch stubs at four corners. Yes, because this is a down-firing sub, it may be placed anywhere within Bluetooth range of the bar, however, it’s recommended that you position it on the floor rather than on your cabinet shelf. There is an LED at the back that indicates when the woofer is paired and connected.

The IR LED is visible from the top of Philps’ remote control, which is rather basic and plasticky. It’s easy to grip and does the job well. There are buttons to switch inputs, and an EQ button to switch sound presets playback controls and volume controls. We are glad there’s a mute button too.

Connectivity options are quite basic. An HDMI ARC port, optical in, and aux port are included. There’s also Bluetooth 4.2.

Because the cables aren’t included in the box, you’ll have to buy these separately. It’s best if you connect it via HDMI ARC. I no longer carry audio in thumb drives so didn’t particularly miss the USB port, but I know of people who do.

Philips TAB5305 faired surprisingly well in our analysis, especially for watching movies and videos. There is proper stereo separation and dialogues are clean and clear. The down-firing subwoofer also performed better than expected. The bass isn’t thumpy but it could pick sub-bass frequencies rather well and added the right amount of rumble needed while watching movies.

As for music, it’s hard to expect much from a 70W 2.1 channel system but once again the TAB5305 proved good enough to handle the needs of casual listeners. At the price, Dolby Digital support would have been better.

There are three audio presets – movie, music, and news – and you can switch between them from the EQ button. The color of the LED light is the only indication for different source and audio presets and frankly it gets very confusing. There is also no proprietary app to make the task simpler. The LED blinks white for three seconds for the Music mode, green for 3 seconds to denote Movie mode, and red for the News mode.

Other than that, the Philips TAB5305 performed very reliably. We didn’t run into any performance issues or unexpected glitches while switching between different sources and modes. 

On paper, several more cheap soundbars may match or even exceed the specs of the Philips TAB5305, which costs INR 14,999. However, what makes it stand apart is that it is solid with the basics. It sounds better than the majority of half-baked items in this price range.

While the TAB5305 lacks fancy assistant support, HDMI pass-through, and a half-hearted attempt at Dolby Atmos, it just sounds excellent and performs properly. It also looks distinct and will add to your home decor. It’s a product that will appeal to casual consumers who recognize the value of the Philips brand.

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