Digital Trends

If you're looking for a top notch home theater system which looks great and has a nice technology feature set to boot, the recently released Philips HTS9800W 6.1 home theater system might be your ticket to a glamorous home movie night. This system, priced at around $900, won the CES Innovations 2006 Award for the home theater category.

 

Described by Philips as the perfect compliment to a flat panel television display mounted on the wall, the stylish, touch-screen enabled HTS9800W system has a “slim & flexible design” which can be wall mounted, extremely slim flat panel front speakers and wireless rear speakers. All of this plus delivery of a wide array of cutting edge home entertainment technologies.

 

Out of the box, the Philips HTS9800W looks to deliver a 6.1 sound system home theater experience via its omni-directional, neodymium ribbon tweeter speakers with an included sub-woofer. Besides delivering audio support for Dolby Digital EX, the HTS9800W offers these as just a few of its audio features: multi-channel Super Audio CD playback; a 24-bit, 192kHz D/A converter; eight equalizer settings; total sound power of 800 watts; and total output power of 3x125 watts in the front, 2x85 watts in the rear and 105 watts via the sub-woofer.

 

Image Courtesy of Philips

 

Bridging the gap between audio and video, the HTS9800W delivers HDMI output for digital HD video and digital multi-channel audio support. This system, through its included DVD player, also supports a wide array of additional optical disc formats, including DVD, DVD+/-R/RW, (S)VCD, MPEG4, DivX, CD-R/RW, MP3, MP3-CD and JPEG. 

 

In the realm of video, this Philips system offers video up-scaling to 720p/1080i; 16:9 aspect ratio support; component video output; a 12-bit, 108MHz D/A converter; and NSTC/PAL video disc playback support.

 

Other features of the HTS9800W include still picture playback with MP3 slideshow support, parental control support, a built-in FM radio with 20 presets, three on-screen languages, an included remote control, a quick start guide and color-coded connections.

 

More information on the Philips HTS9800W can be found at Philips' Web site.