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Devialet Dione soundbar reviews roundup

Can $2500 buy soundbar heaven?

In March, French company Devialet announced their new Dolby Atmos 5.1.2 soundbar with built in subs and a so-called “ORB” center directional speaker at a rich $3990 (now mostly available at a still pricy $2400). Devialet wants to compete with B&W and the Dione is positioned against the Sennheiser Ambeo. From the reviews, it seems like the Dione (Greek for “goddess”) may be a contender in that competition.

The Dione has 17 drivers with eight for full range audio, eight for the subwoofers and a center driver for that ORB. It claims a built-in gyroscope for directionality and orientation–though it is not automatic nor motorized (you apparently move it manually).

The Dione utilizes the Analog Digital Hybrid amplifier chip from the company’s Phantom speakers. It has Devialet’s “Space” feature that upscales stereo input into virtual 5.1.2 audio channels and makes use of proprietary Advanced Dimensional Experience (ADE) beamforming. IO is  a single HDMI 2.1 eARC port (with CEC) Ethernet, optical, and AC power input and Bluetooth 5.0 and Wi-Fi for streaming audio using Airplay 2 and Spotify Connect.

Here’s what Divialet said about it in March.

Here’s what other people are saying now.

DEVIALET DIONE SOUNDBAR REVIEW: BRILLIANT BASS FOR AN EXORBITANT PRICE (Chris Welch, the Verge)
By the magnitude of its $2,400 price alone, the Devialet Dione soundbar comes with sky-high expectations. This ultra-premium Dolby Atmos bar is a solo performer: it doesn’t come with a separate subwoofer, nor does Diavelet even sell such a thing. At 26.5 pounds and measuring nearly four feet wide, it’s a hulking piece of home theater equipment that’s considerably heavier than Sony’s HT-A7000 — let alone something like the Sonos Arc.

The industrial design is unlike anything you’ll find on shelves when browsing more mainstream offerings at your local Best Buy. How many soundbars have an orb molded into the middle?

The Dione kicks out up to 950 watts of amplification power, with a claimed frequency response of 24Hz to 21kHz. That low end is impressive — the Sonos Arc only reaches around 47.6Hz — and made possible with the help of eight long-throw bass woofers built into the soundbar. MORE@The Verge

My colleague Jez Ford at WhatHiFi? thought the Dione lifted the soundbar to another level; they get into the build and their thorough critical listening for music and dialogue.

DEVIALET DIONE REVIEW (Jez Ford)
If you haven’t heard of Devialet, you may have at least seen this French company’s distinctive ‘Phantom’ active speakers, widely praised for their remarkable abilities to create high sound pressure levels with minimal distortion from a compact design. But the company’s innovations in amplification are of equal importance to its speaker technologies – and of course both come together in a soundbar design.

“There’s no trajectory, like in Atmos,” we were told. “We use real-time analysis to identify the reverberant ambience, take it away from the direct sound and then fire to you the direct sound, while enhancing the soundstage with the ambience. If you have a live concert, say, the music will stay upfront while the applause may cover the rest of the room, and this doesn’t deform the signal too much. It works well with concerts, it works very well with action movies.

We nearly always find music from a soundbar to be heavily compromised – but here Dido’s Isobel simply did not sound as if it was coming from a soundbar. There was rich bass, a spacious soundstage with a delightfully aspirant lead vocal and oodles of atmosphere, even a wide stereo spread, so that the drum roll into the middle eight emerged firmly off to the left. What a performance!

We combined video with music and gave Hamilton a run in Dolby Atmos from Disney+. This is a production where the bass and the beats are vital to the overall musical effect, and goodness! – how the Devialet had this covered, whether the deep rolling bass line underpinning the delicious Helpless, or the punchy kick drum and organ-like bass underpinning Wait For It.  With Hamilton’s score it was clear that the Dione was not merely competent, not just ‘acceptable for a soundbar’; this was a large-scale musical performance at hi-fi levels of quality. So we must temper our truism that soundbars are an inevitable compromise in audio terms; Devialet has found a way, and the Dione, like its namesake, is indeed a diva.

No subwoofer here, of course, but you needn’t worry about missing something in the lower frequencies. In Obi-Wan E03 the Fifth Brother character (played by Sung Kang) is given a ridiculous halo of bass surrounding his speech; this was delivered by the Dione as, well, suitably ridiculous.  MORE@What HiFi?

My colleague Simon Lucas at Tom’s Guide was similarly impressed:

Devialet Dione review: This powerful Dolby Atmos soundbar blew us away (Simon Lucas)
Never knowingly understated, the Devialet Dione soundbar manages to bring a little of the high-end company’s customary design drama to the world of do-it-all, add-on TV speakers. In keeping with much of its luxury output, the Dione is properly expensive, strikingly stylish, and a full-on 5.1.2 Dolby Atmos affair, designed to deliver a surround-sound experience from a single unit (albeit a sizable one).

Specification is extensive, build quality is unarguable and the finish is flawless. Connectivity is adequate, control options are effective (even though it goes without a remote control) and performance… well, performance is authentically startling. MORE@Tom’s Guide

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