Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 Soundbar Review

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has a sleek design. There's a tight fabric covering on the front and most of the back of the bar, and the top and the sides have an aluminum feel. The bottom of the bar is made of plastic.

This soundbar doesn't come with a subwoofer; however, you can purchase one separately.

The Harman/Kardon 1300 is quite large, so it likely can't fit between the legs of your 55" TV. On the upside, it isn't very tall, so it shouldn't block your TV screen unless your TV sits flush on the table.

On the back of the bar, there are a few openings for the inputs and the power cable. There are also proprietary mounts so you can mount it on your wall, and the brackets and screws are included.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has an impressive build quality. The fabric covering the front and the back is tight and doesn't seem like it could rip easily. The top and the sides have an aluminum feel, which seems solid, but unfortunately is also prone to collecting fingerprints over time.

• Manuals
• Mounting template
• Remote with 2xAA batteries
• Mounting brackets and screws
• AUX cable
• Optical cable
• HDMI cable
• Power cable

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has a decent stereo frequency response. With its Automatic Multibeam Calibration room correction feature turned on, this soundbar has a slightly bass-heavy sound profile that adds a little extra punch and warmth to your mixes. However, it struggles to reproduce a thumpy low-bass, which can be disappointing for fans of bass-heavy music or action-packed movies. It also comes with a bass adjustment feature and several EQ presets to help you customize its sound more to your liking.

With its room correction feature turned on and the bass adjustment set to -4, the Harman/Kardon 1300 has a decent stereo frequency response. It reproduces a very neutral sound profile that's suitable for listening to lots of different types of audio content. However, it still struggles to reproduce a deep, thumpy low-bass, which can be disappointing if you like to feel the rumbles in bass-heavy music.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has a great stereo soundstage performance. The soundstage is perceived to be bigger than the table. Audio sounds a bit processed and mixed to make the soundstage seem bigger, but it doesn't sound too unnatural. It also has very good focus, so objects seem to come from an accurate, pinpoint location rather than a general area.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has a great stereo dynamics performance. It can get loud without a lot of compression at max volume, so it's suitable for listening to audio at parties and in large rooms.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300's stereo THD performance is decent. Distortion falls within good limits at normal listening volumes, resulting in clear and pure audio reproduction. However, there's a jump in distortion when you play the bar at max volume. This may not be very noticeable with real-life content, though.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has an excellent center channel performance. This 5.0 setup offers a discrete center channel, which helps to more clearly and accurately reproduce voices in dialogue-centric content like TV shows. Though it struggles to reproduce low-bass, this shouldn't be too noticeable, since there typically isn't a lot of low-bass in audio content played on the center channel.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has a passable surrounds performance. It uses its front and side-firing speakers to create phantom localization. Unfortunately, this doesn't sound as clear and real as discrete surround speakers, so objects in the soundstage like voices and footsteps may not be clearly and accurately represented. These objects are perceived as coming from in front of you, rather than from all around you.

For a soundbar that supports Atmos content, check out the JBL Bar 5.0 MultiBeam.

This soundbar has a mediocre selection of sound enhancement features. It comes with a room correction feature called Automatic Multibeam Calibration, which automatically optimizes the audio reproduction based on the unique acoustic characteristics of the room you're listening in. It also offers five EQ presets to help you customize its sound: 'Standard', 'Music', 'Movie', 'Voice', and 'Personal'. The 'Personal' preset is a customizable preset, and you can store up to five different presets on the remote by adjusting the bass to your desired level. However, it lacks more robust sound customization features, such as a graphic EQ.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has several physical inputs, including three Full HDMI In ports that let you use the bar as a hub between different devices. There's also an AUX port, so you can wire older devices and smartphones to the bar to play audio.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 Soundbar supports Dolby Digital via ARC, which is commonly found on Blu-ray discs and streaming platforms. However, it doesn't support DTS. While sound was playing from the bar during our DTS tests, the bar displays that it's playing PCM content instead of DTS.

Update 04/13/2021: After retesting the bar with a different HDMI splitter, we confirmed that the bar supports 5.1 PCM.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has satisfactory audio format support via Full HDMI In. It supports more common formats like Dolby Digital and DTS, which are found on Blu-ray discs and streaming platforms. However, it doesn't support more premium surround sound formats like Dolby Digital Plus and DTS:X.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 supports both Dolby Digital and DTS content via Optical. These formats are commonly found on Blu-ray discs and streaming platforms.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has an amazing latency performance. It has low latency over its ARC, Optical, and Full HDMI In ports, so video and audio are in sync, making it suitable for watching videos and movies. However, some apps and some TVs compensate for latency differently, so your real-world experience may vary.

The Harman/Kardon 1300 has incredible wireless playback connectivity. You can wirelessly stream audio from your phone or your tablet to the bar over Bluetooth or Wi-Fi, and it also supports Chromecast built-in. However, it doesn't support Apple AirPlay, which can be disappointing for listeners with Apple smartphones.

The Harman/Kardon 1300 can passthrough the highest quality signals. When connected between your PC and your TV, text on the screen looks clear and crisp.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 has a small display screen. It shows all the settings that you change, as well as the inputs and the volume level. You can also have it display the firmware version by pressing a sequence of buttons on the remote.

On top of the bar, there are a few physical controls. You can use them to turn the bar on and off, adjust the volume, and change the inputs.

This soundbar has a fairly simple remote that lets you control all of the bar's functions. You can use the Sound Mode button to switch between the five EQ presets: ' Standard', 'Music', 'Movie', 'Voice', and 'Personal'. The five preset buttons on the remote are for the Personal Presets, which you can program yourself by changing the bass adjustment to the desired level.

The Harman/Kardon Enchant 1300 doesn't have a dedicated companion app. However, you can use the Google Home app to set up the bar and connect it to Wi-Fi. The Google Home app also lets you complete firmware updates, cast to the bar with Chromecast built-in, and adjust the bar's volume level.

This soundbar goes into standby mode after ten minutes of inactivity. It also supports HDMI CEC, so you can use your TV remote to control some of the bar's basic functions.