If I was ever to define a “Mount Everest of soundbars” it would be one with great dialogue, excellent streaming capabilities and fine music replay. The Sennheiser Ambeo Max is right there, but also comes with an insurmountable $2,500 price tag. What if you’re looking for something a little closer to Earth?

Enter the Bose Smart Soundbar 600. This TV speakers features all the things most people care most about — excellent sound quality, wide format support, even voice control — and it does so for a much more affordable price. It also offers HDMI connectivity and music streaming over Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

It’s a close tussle, however, between the Bose 600 and the rival Sonos Beam, which offers a similar feature set for a similar price. In my book the Sonos squeaks ahead due to its established multiroom ecosystem, a choice of voice assistants and its ability to sound best without a sub. That said, if you’re looking for a soundbar with excellent speech clarity, “true” Dolby Atmos capability, and a clear upgrade path, the Bose Smart Soundbar 600 really is a one-stop-shop.

What is it?

The Bose Smart Soundbar 600 is a follow-up to last year’s Smart Soundbar 900, and while the new unit has made cuts to size and cost, it performs many of the same duties. That is, this is a Dolby Atmos soundbar

Happy Saturday, everybody! Everyone on the Verge Deals team is enjoying their weekend and we hope you are, too. If you were looking to engage in a little retail therapy or do a little window shopping, we’ve collected a handful of deals we think you’ll want to check out.

If you’re constantly misplacing all the important things in your life, it might be time to invest in a set of Bluetooth trackers. Right now, you can pick up a four-pack of Tile Pro trackers from Tile for just $49.99 ($50 off), the lowest price we’ve seen for the bundle to date. The Tile Pro is Tile’s most powerful tracking fob, with a range of up to 400 feet and a louder ring than its smaller counterparts. Just like other Tile trackers, the Pro is also water-resistant, works with voice assistants like Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant, and is compatible with both Android and Apple devices — something that can be said of Apple’s AirTags.

The Xbox Elite 2 Core bears a striking resemblance to the more expensive Elite Series 2 but doesn’t come packaged with the additional D-pad, the charging case, back paddles, or thumbsticks. The Core still supports these components with the same swappable design, however, the extra accessories must be purchased separately. Otherwise, the Core is functionally the same controller as the standard Elite 2, offering custom profiles, adjustable tension thumbsticks, three-point trigger stops, and custom button mapping.

Perhaps the best part of the charging station, however,

Dolby Atmos is one of the biggest upgrades to audio in many years, and while the immersive format works OK with music, it really shines with movies. Atmos soundbars are capable of room-filling sound, come in compact designs and are more affordable than ever.

The Sonos Beam Gen 2 ($449) and the Bose Smart Soundbar 600 ($499) are two of the best Atmos soundbars for the money, but with very similar sizes, features and prices, how do you choose between them? Let’s break it down.

Sonos

With the addition of Dolby Atmos, the Sonos Beam Gen 2 is an even better smart soundbar than the original. You may be missing out on deep bass without a sub, but the speaker makes your movies sound huge anyway with its virtual surround capabilities.

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Bose

The Bose Smart Soundbar 600 is a compact Dolby Atmos speaker with dedicated height speakers, and its sound quality is top-notch, especially for dialogue-heavy movies and TV shows. The soundbar also adds multiroom music and the Alexa voice assistant.

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Movies

One of the major additions to the new Sonos Beam Gen 2 was Dolby Atmos support, but it didn’t involve any hardware changes — only software. Despite its lack of dedicated height speakers, the Beam is actually really good at simulating height effects — better than anything else that’s comparable at this price or below.

As proficient as the

Substacks has launched Substacks Chata new discussions feature designed to provide content creators with the means to build up their own online communities outside of social media.

Substack Chat allows writers, podcasters, and other creators to host conversations with their audiences, setting a topic for discussion without needing to hack together integrations with services such as Discord, Telegram, or Slack. Chat can be made available for all subscribers or restricted to those that pay for your content.

“Chat is a community space reimagined specifically for writers and creators — it’s like having your own private social network where you make the rules,” Substack said in a post announcing the feature. Substacks has been openly trying to capitalize on Twitter users leaving the platform since Elon Musk took up the reins as chief Twitter. While other platforms haven’t been quite as brazen, Twitter alternatives are nevertheless seeing an influx of new users in recent weeks, with Mastodon reporting that 199,430 people have joined the platform since Twitter changed ownership.

Endorsements from creators who are already using the Chat feature also appear motivated by the Twitter acquisition. “Elon Musk isn’t the only guy who can run a Social Media company,” says sports journalist Joe Posnanski, a quote that was pulled from his JoeBlogs subscriber chat announcement.

Substack Chat is currently only available via the iOS app, though the company says the feature is rolling out gradually with both Web