VIZIO SB2020n-J6 Home Theater Sound Bar (Renewed)

easy assemble and good sound

This renewed product came in a Vizio Refurbished box with all accessories. Everything including the soundbar looks brand new. Hookup is easy via optical cable from the TV. The sound adjustments takes some getting used to as the soundbar only has a single LED for status (the more expensive Vizio soundbars have multiple LEDs to display more intuitive status at a glance). It provides some voice prompts to help in making settings but you'll need to read the manual to properly set Bass and Treble. Best of all, the soundbar's sound is excellent for its size and includes a small bass reflex port on the back to enhance the lower frequency sounds (but you won't get pounding bass like you would from a dedicated subwoofer). This Vizio SB2020 replaces my older Vizio soundbar (SB2820) only because the older one is a bit too tall to fit under our new 55" TV and I wanted the TV to be mounted as low as possible. The SB2020 has a much richer sound than our old one and is much smaller, as well. Overall, it's worth trying the renewed/refurbished products since it's a great way to get an essentially new item at a good discount. If for some reason you get one that is damaged or worn beyond your liking, then you should return it for another one.

best to connect with an optical audio cable, HDMI n/a. good sound and value $38 used

My entertainment unit, as pictured, has a little space that seemed perfect for a compact soundbar. Since TVs are getting thinner and only apple can make great sounding tiny speakers, even a small soundbar like this can make almost any modern tv sound much better. This has been a great budget solution for a person who wanted budget, aesthetics and good enough sound.This soundbar solved three main things for me:1) Perfect size to not be an eyesore in my living room.2) Superior sound to my tv by a huge leap; while there are much better sounding systems, a soundbar is always meant to be about cost and convenience compared a true sound system. Perhaps a 2.1 setup would be preferable, but for under $100? Forget about it!3) No more rear-firing speakers!! I love modern tv design, except that there’s no good place for built-in speakers. So by firing towards the wall, with bad quality is a lose-lose in my book. Additionally, with two young children, I can watch tv with my wife after the kids go down at a higher volume since the speakers are no longer firing back in the direction of their room.Downsides:1) bass: not a downside for me; it has superior bass to my tv and it doesn’t hit the lowest frequencies but there are limitations to physics and sound output. Small speakers mean no big bass.2) volume cutoff: this is a peculiar one. If the registered sound input is too low, the speaker will not output the sound. You’ll see this as a frustration for most reviewers. The solution is to keep television volume high and adjust the soundbar volume. Small adjustments to tv won’t effect quieter scenes, so you’re not 100% dependent on soundbar control, you’ll just need to find a sweet spot or only do soundbar control.

I purchased this sound bar for my gaming computer to sit under my monitor. I wanted to replace the floppy left and right speakers and clean things up more.I was very suprised how good the sound was produced! Great bass and the DTS digital X sounds awesome when it's enabled in Windows sound settings. I wish I knew how good soundbars could be, I'll be buying another for my TV in my living room!The speaker doesn't have a HDMI input, so it's connected via optical cable which was not included in the package. No big deal since they are relatively inexpensive. Plus I don't to use another controller when connected to a TV, since the TV usually has an option to disable the onboard speakers and switch to optical.Anyway, switching inputs is super easy and the speaker audibly announces what channel I'm switching to, so it makes it a breeze.Excellent sound, great value. Highly recommended.

Don't laugh -- I'm a studio engineer and wanted a compact near field computer monitor for my desk. This 20" Vizio is insanely good. You will not need a subwoofer for this kind of application or a small room like a bedroom. Start with the default settings and fine tune as you like. I gave it a little bump on the bass and a couple of bumps on the treble -- no sibalance! As you adjust the bass & treble, a voice tells you when you're at default, low and top adjustment. For near field or a small room, this will be plenty loud. If you push it too hard, will hear some clipping -- but that's going to be really loudI got mine through the Amazon Renewed store and it came perfectly packaged, just like totally new for $55.For reference, I also own the Bose "TV Speaker" soundbar (that cost $250.00) for our home theater setup (I use it to carry the L-R rear audio in a small living room. While the Bose is 25 inches, sounds excellent and does a few things this Vizio doesn't, I could not justify buying that Bose again. Bottom line: if space is tight, this little 20" bar is AMAZING. I'm going to guess the larger 36" Vizio models are going to be head to head with Bose for way less.

UPDATE: The seller contacted me about sending a replacement remote.First thing I noticed was that the remote back was broken. All 4 tabs were snapped off. I sent a message to the seller, no reply. Next, I tried to use an optical cable. It says not compatible. Both the vizio speaker and vizio TV have an optical hole in it. Using Bluetooth, it has to be reconnected everytime you turn it back on. Aux works well. If you don't turn it off, it will stay on and you won't have to reconnect it. I like the night time feature. I also like the speaker's voice.The regular price is $79 and the refurbished price is about $46, so I'm not sending it back. A replacement remote is $15.99, but I can get a cheaper one for $7.99... Which is cheaper than sending it back apparently.