You can customize the sound of Klipsch’s new soundbar for exactly where you sit

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Klipsch has announced its new Flexus Core 300 soundbar, which it says is the industry's first to use Dirac's Live Room Correction technology to optimize sound specifically for the room it's installed in and the room listeners are sitting in. Dirac Live is typically only included in amplifiers and receivers that are part of a more complex – and expensive – home theater setup.

The $999 Flexus Core 300 will be “available this winter,” according to Which hi-fi system? and features eight side, front and top-firing 2.25-inch speakers and four 4-inch subwoofers. Connectivity includes Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, 8K pass-through HDMI, HDMI eARC, USB-C and a digital audio port. Switching inputs and adjusting settings like EQ is done via Klipsch's Connect Plus mobile app, available for iOS and Android.

Adapting sound output to room layout, size and shape is not a new feature for soundbars, but the implementation varies. Samsung's SpaceFit Sound uses a microphone on the soundbar itself to determine how sound is affected as it bounces around the room, while LG's AI Room Calibration uses a mobile app and a smartphone's built-in microphone to run tests and determine what sound corrections need to be made.

The soundbar's controls are limited; additional features can be accessed via an iOS or Android mobile app.
Image: Klipsch

Dirac Live Room Correction technology is more comprehensive, relying on a Windows or macOS app and a microphone connected to a laptop to take sound measurements at several different locations in a room where listeners are sitting. Dirac Live uses all of these measurements to calibrate the soundbar and create a “coherent and natural sound environment” that “improves the clarity of dialogue in movies and the purity of vocals in music.”

The Klipsch Flexus Core 300 comes standard with a “Limited Bandwidth” license for Dirac Live software, which corrects only frequencies up to 500 Hz. Dirac also plans to eventually provide a “Full Bandwidth” license for the soundbar for an additional fee, which corrects frequencies that supposedly span the entire range of human hearing – up to 20 kHz.

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