A brief visit to Denon’s website makes clear how revered the Japanese giant’s AV and hi-fi offerings have been in recent years, picking up a dazzling array of awards from across the globe for its efforts. But it isn’t just its AV receivers and hi-fi amplifiers that have the wowed the critics – the HEOS wireless multiroom system has also seen much praise from all corners.
Recently, Denon introduced self-contained wireless speakers that form part of the Home range. While these speakers are fully compatible with pre-existing HEOS set-ups, Home is a simplified take on wireless speakers – and one that allows Denon to focus on what the products were designed for in the first place: playing music, and playing it well!
With three sizes of Home speaker, a soundbar and subwoofer, Denon keeps the HEOS Home range simple yet effective. The Home 150, Home 250 and Home 350 offer small, medium and large solutions for music playback and are available in black and white. The HEOS Home Sound Bar 550 transforms your TV’s sound while also doubling up as an impressive music speaker. The Home Subwoofer takes bass to a new dimension, making both music and movies sound action-packed.
The Home 150 is compact – very compact – measuring just shy of 19cm in height and a tiny 12cm in both depth and width. But, beneath this dinky exterior, Denon has packed a 25mm tweeter and an 89mm woofer so it packs a punch that belies its diminutive size. Having started life as a dedicated 2-channel hi-fi brand, Denon knows the importance of quality components, and the inclusion of two high-quality digital amplifiers, as well as a top DAC, means that the Home 150 kicks out plenty of sound, and can also handle Hi-Res Audio streaming of ALAC and DSD, too!
Those who are less stuck for space are nicely catered for with the Home 250, the first of the range to include stereo speakers, while also housing twin passive radiators – bringing the 250 to a total of six speaker units. With four of the aforementioned digital amplifiers running the show, the Home 250 finds it much easier to fill out larger spaces, such as a kitchen or even a smaller living room.
The Denon Home 350
Last of the speakers, but certainly not least, is the Home 350 – the biggest and baddest of the bunch! With six drive units, the 350 equals the 250 – but these drivers are all driven from dedicated amplifiers, rather than running passively like two of the Home 250s. At 295mm in width and 216mm in height, the Home 350 is perfect for larger rooms, dedicated listening areas, or just for anyone who wants to go loud without the speakers feeling the strain! And if this still isn’t enough for you, all three of the models can be set as stereo pairs, allowing you to combine two speakers into a L+R configuration, just like a traditional hi-fi system!
Denon’s Home Sound Bar 550 and Subwoofer expand HEOS’s talents to the home cinema field. Quality speaker units deliver clarity and detail that TV speakers can’t hope to match. The soundbar is also compatible with Dolby Atmos and DTS:X, giving you a cinematic 3D
sound experience. Add the Subwoofer and the dedicated 8-inch bass driver produces a seismic bottom end response that’s perfect for recreating ‘edge-of-seat’ thrills from the best action movies. For truly enveloping sound, partner a Sound Bar 550 and Subwoofer with a pair of Home 150 or Home 250 speakers as rear surrounds.
A streaming speaker isn’t much without music to stream, and the Home range has access to a huge number of streaming services, including Amazon Music HD, Spotify / Spotify Connect, Tidal, Deezer and many more. There’s also access to the TuneIn radio app, with its unrestricted access to 20,000+ internet radio stations from across the planet.
The multiroom side of things works a treat too, with the free app snappy and responsive in use. You can just have the 150 in the bedroom playing if you choose, but why not have the 250 in the kitchen and the 350 in the lounge playing at the same time? You can set individual volumes on each unit that’s part of a group and also ungroup them at the touch of a button.
So that’s Denon’s Home range, which as an addition to HEOS is a further improvement and refinement of an excellent system, and one that anybody that’s thinking they’d like a multiroom set-up should absolutely audition for themselves. If sound quality is your priority (and it really should be) the Denon Home series is an absolute must listen. Well done, Denon!
Find out more about the Denon Home series here.
Author: Chris, Liverpool store
