For Better TV Sound, Add a Bar

That TV you just bought might be high-definition, but the sound from that set is most definitely not.

If the atrocious retail sales environment has one upside, it is that there has never been a better time to buy a TV. Pick your maker. Pick your store. Everybody from Sony (SNE Quote) to Samsung, from Best Buy (BBY Quote) to Wal-Mart (WMT Quote), is trying to turn our national TV addiction into whatever sales they can.

However, audio nerds like me have a major bone to pick with the cheap flat-panel bonanza: Low-cost TVs that are hot sellers these days almost always come with equally low-fidelity sound systems. If these sets have speakers at all -- many don't, so be sure to check -- they are usually mass-produced, way-offshore jobs that make the AM radio in my mother's old 1968 Caprice sound good. ...