By Rashmi Goel
https://www.sonos.com
The Sonos Ray has many qualities to admire, including how small it is. It's a good thing that Sonos offers compact, high-performing soundbars because most soundbars ignore the fact that many people own small TVs (40in or so). It has everything that makes Sonos so successful - the ease of use, the coherence of the control app, and the Trueplay-assisted setup that takes seconds. There's a lot of thought that went into building and finishing this product. There is no price that can be put on the pride of ownership, but the Ray gives you a lot of it. Sonos audio is also incorporated into the Ray. There's something unified, confident, and detailed about The Ray - it's got the power to carry a Hollywood blockbuster forward, and also has the deft ways of communicating to ensure you never miss a word in a conversation. Using it as a music speaker is quite entertaining, as well. When you compare Ray with its obvious rivals, however, it isn't the largest-scale listen on the market. Consequently, Sonos wasn't quite able to meet its goal.
Design: Sonos Ray Soundbar
https://www.sonos.com
As It looks and feels like a quality product, to an extent. Despite its matte finish, it is made with the same level of detail and care as the rest of the brand's products. This product has a mild trapezoidal shape with rounded-off edges, and despite the liberal use of plastic in its construction, it seems and feels solid and premium. Sonos says the Ray is designed to work with TV screens up to 55-inches thanks to its compact dimensions (2.8 x 22 x 3.7-inches). Although it is made to handle smaller TVs (around 40-inches, say), it can also handle larger screens. Having all the drivers facing forwards, it fits well on a TV stand's middle shelf if a surface is directly above it. However, keep in mind that it's a little taller than quite a few alternatives - so be sure that it doesn't foul the bottom of your TV if you want it on the same shelf as your TV. Sonos also offers a wall bracket (as an option).
Connectivity: Sonos Ray Soundbar
https://www.sonos.com
All of the physical connections on the chassis are contained in a recess located at the rear of the chassis - power, Ethernet, and optical are all connected here. This panel contains a reset button. In terms of wireless connectivity, you have Wi-Fi and Apple AirPlay 2. There are no HDMI ports, so one must use a digital optical cable to connect - Sonos includes a 1.5m version with the soundbar and the power cord. When it comes to the compact Ray's sound creation, it uses a pair of tweezers, a pair of 'mid-woofers' (which is an awkward way of trying to create a mid/bass driver that sounds exciting), and two bass reflex ports. The speakers are all oriented forward, firing squad-style, behind the soundbar's grille. Thus, this is a stereo speaker. And while it can play Dolby Digital 5.1 or DTS Digital Surround content as well as stereo PCM files, anything more complicated than two channels of content will be downscaled. As with other models in Sonos' line, the full specifications are closely guarded, including the amount of power the Ray uses or the size and composition of its speaker drivers (just that they're elliptical and split to achieve wider dispersion).
Controls: Sonos Ray Soundbar
https://www.sonos.com
When you use your Sonos Ray as part of a multi-room system, voice control is possible - although the Ray itself isn't compatible with voice assistant, though that may all change when the bespoke Sonos assistant is released. The Sonos control app enables extensive control (reliable and excellent). In the most stable and logical control app around, you can fiddle with EQ settings, integrate your favorite streaming service, adjust volume, switch loudness on or off ('off' is preferred), or do some 'speech enhancement', and more. The Ray is equipped with a discreet little strip of LEDs behind its grille, which shows you exactly what the device is up to. In the control app, you can turn them off if you prefer.
Sound Quality: Sonos Ray Soundbar
https://www.sonos.com
Sonos Ray is an excellent compact soundbar in many ways. With its fancy-pants audio system, it sounds better than any TV that does not carry a high price tag, and it does very well as a music speaker as well. Ray's compositions immediately impress me for their unity, tonality, and presentation. As for the lower frequency range (which is punchy, controlled, and quite varied in terms of texture and timbre), it has plenty of presence without being even slightly in your face, yet on the other end of the scale, it has a polite level of bite and attack. While other soundbars of the same size and specification may reach higher frequencies than the Ray, none offer superior control and detail.
However, the Sonos shines in the midrange. Its language is direct, specific and unambiguous - speech has a distinct character, attitude, and emotion, and as a result, the Ray communicates effectively. The majority of the action in most movie soundtracks comes from dialogue, and Sonos delivers it in full. A film soundtrack should also contain a lot of dynamic variation, and the Ray can cope with even the most sudden and/or extensive changes in volume. Moreover, it creates an effective soundstage, though a relatively narrow one at that, and the point of sound is always evident.
Switch to some music — a Tidal-derived stream of "I Been Gone" by Moon Duo, for example — and the Sonos continues its (almost entirely) good work. Detail levels are high, the soundstage — while still rather confined — is well organized, and there’s proper tonality unity throughout the frequency range. The Ray has sufficient punch to drive the tune forwards, although it’s a little inhibited when it comes to giving rhythms authentic expression. Its powers of midrange articulacy continue to impress, though. Overall, by the standards of properly affordable soundbars, the Sonos Ray is an enjoyable and engaging music-maker. The standards of properly affordable soundbars, though, are pretty high in some instances. And there’s no doubt the Sonos Ray seems a little pricey when judged purely on its sonic performance — certainly there are alternatives from the likes of Yamaha that put in a slightly more expansive performance while costing handily less than this.
Conclusion
https://www.sonos.com
When you already own a Sonos speaker or two and are looking for a compact soundbar with some impressive performance highlights, look no further: the Sonos Ray is here to charm and delight you. The Ray isn't the only game in town, though, if you don't care about wider multi-room possibilities - and you can get nearly as much of what the Ray offers without spending as much as Sonos.