At the top face we get the built-in buttons with Polk using physical buttons in the shape of their functionality. To be honest we like these much more that the touch sensitive ones that some brands are using as these are much less prone to fail or accidental input. There is nothing else visible at the top as the up-firing drivers are hidden under the cloth grille keeping a very minimalistic look. Everyone loves surround sound, right? But no one can be bothered to accommodate it any more – all those speakers and cables running everywhere. Soundbars are far more convenient. No matter how much they try, however, none have managed a convincing ‘virtual surround’ effect. The nifty Polk MagniFi Max SR soundbar doesn’t even try to go virtual. The surround speakers do a decent job of hurling effects behind you, with suitably similar voicing to the soundbar that they don’t jar. After having tested most of Polk’s low budget Signa series the MagniFi Max AX feels like a big step forward in terms of cinematic performance and immersion. It feels like Polk took everything that made the Signa S4 such a fan favorite product and added more features and capabilities for the more demanding consumers. The wireless subwoofer has a downward-firing 8-inch driver and 160W of amplification. It’s fairly small and neat – 37cm high, the same in width, and 31cm deep – so it’s easily hidden behind a sofa.

POLK AUDIO MagniFi Max AX Dolby Atmos Soundbar and Wireless

However, the Philips Fidelio B5 offers the same sort of form factor, but more balanced sound – if you can still find one for sale. There are also plenty of ways to stream wirelessly, including Chromecast, AirPlay 2, and Spotify Connect, as well as Bluetooth 5.0. Alongside Dolby Atmos, the Magnifi Max AX also supports its main rival for Blu-ray discs, DTS:X spatial audio. As for the subwoofer the one that comes with the soundbar is a bass reflex design with both the driver and the port located at the bottom. The subwoofer, as is the case with most soundbars, is made of some kind of MDF or wood and features a rather cubic design with curved corners. It’s so simple in design that it can be very well mixed for a small table or something like that. There’s even a fourth set of volume controls labelled ‘surround’. These allow control of a pair of wireless rear speakers that are available as an upgrade option; we didn’t have access to these during our review. New Flagship Systems Elevate Movie, TV, Gaming and Music Experiences with Immersive Surround Sound and Deep Bass ImpactYou’d have thought that with immersive formats, such as Dolby Atmos and DTS:X, bigger is better. But bigger often means more speakers and more space at a greater expense. With Terminator: Dark Fate, the car chase in Mexico has proved a problem for some soundbars in terms of protecting dialogue from the cacophony of special effects. Setup is simple with 3-in/1-out high-speed, high-bandwidth 4K HDMI connectivity and input switching. Connect the sound bars to gaming consoles, Blu-ray players, streaming boxes, and more. Connection to your TV is via HDMI eARC or ARC with the included HDMI cable; an optical input allows connection to older devices. And there are volume controls – lots of them, indeed. One pair of buttons for the main volume. A second pair labelled ‘Voice’ to individually adjust the centre channel (presumably the function inspiring a mysterious bottom section to the lozenge engraved with the words “Voice Adjust”; we have no idea why else it’s there).

Polk Audio MagniFi Max AX Review (5.1.2 CH Dolby Atmos Polk Audio MagniFi Max AX Review (5.1.2 CH Dolby Atmos

One area where the soundbar really impressed us was its bass as the 10″ subwoofer really takes no prisoners when it comes to its bass prowess and overall power. If you feed it with some demanding low end performance it will surely punch you in the face with its constant sound waves but not on the expense of clarity or detailed bass. Being a ported sub may show its weakness in some extremely crazy tempos and slightly lose its timing but this was a rare case and most of the time will have no problem with whatever you throw at it.In case you do not want to bother changing sound modes every single time you change content there is an Auto mode that choses which mode to use depending the content at play. CARLSBAD, Calif.—September 6, 2022— Polk Audio, the leader in high-performance loudspeaker systems for home and mobile applications, today introduced two new flagship sound bar systems, MagniFi Max AX and MagniFi Max AX SR. These compact, high-performance systems bring movies, TV, music and games to life in immersive, multidimensional Dolby Atmos and DTS:X sound, thanks to 11-speaker arrays featuring dedicated center channels, up-firing height speakers and Polk’s patented Stereo Dimensional Array (SDA) technology. Both models include wireless subwoofers for extended bass response; MagniFi Max AX SR adds two wireless surround speakers for total sonic immersion. Music streaming, custom sound modes and eARC connectivity round out the features of these all-in-one, accessibly priced systems. Getting the whole lot to connect wirelessly is incredibly easy, thanks to sync buttons on each piece of kit. I didn’t have any problem with reliability, either. To get non-lossy Dolby Atmos through to the bar, eARC is required, though mere ARC may still manage to pass compressed Atmos. You’ll know because the remote control provided has a useful ‘info’ key at top right; one press invokes the white alphanumeric LED display behind the lozenge’s front grille to display the input, while two presses very usefully shows the file type, whether PCM 2.0 or Dolby Atmos-MAT.

Magnifi Max AX SR | Polk Audio UK

Things fall down with the integration of the sub, as the soundbar doesn’t extend quite well enough toward the bottom end and neither does the subwoofer attempt to meet it halfway. It probably won’t bother you during most TV viewing, but on occasion it can be too obvious that a certain sound is coming from the sub rather than just the system as a whole. You don’t want a subwoofer to be a distraction, but you also don’t want to turn it down so much that you might as well not have it.The MagniFi Mini AX also comes with a downward-firing subwoofer that dwarfs the main unit. As it’s wireless, there’s no cable required, but Polk Audio recommends it’s placed on the same wall and as close to the TV as possible, with no more than a 10m distance between the sub and the main unit. And there were oodles of underlying ominous bass through the close of Pistol episode 2 as well, pulling slightly to the subwoofer’s position (bass is not entirely non-directional) but the clean crossover to the lozenge meant that the combination certainly delivered the impression of something far larger than Polk’s physical solution. The show’s gunshot jingle arrived with marvellously massive slam through the system. First and foremost the remote, and here we were a bit surprised as the one we found in the MagniFi Max AX is completely different from all the other Polk remotes in the past.

Polk Audio Introduces New MagniFi Max AX Sound Bar Systems

It’s pleasing to see a significantly different solution from one of Sound United’s brands; we’ve noted recently one Polk soundbar which shares nearly all attributes except an HDMI input with a near-identical bar from stablemate Denon, and such shared solutions do little to encourage interest in and loyalty to a particular brand. in/1-out HDMI switching with eARC Connect all Your Devices with Integrated Audio and Video Connectivity I'd really like to know how this compares to a Sonos system. This whole system costs as much as 1 piece of the Sonos system.So, rather than going bigger, brands have been getting smaller and more compact. Surround sound setups remain an option for some, but for others, a small soundbar is all that’s required.