INTRODUCTION

   From 2.0 and 2.1 stereo speaker sets to 5.1, 7.1 and ATMOS surround sound speaker systems and even soundbars with numerous speaker configurations (1.0/2.0/2.2/2.1.2/3.1/3.1.2/3.1.3/4.0/5.0.2/5.1/5.1.2/5.1.4/5.2/6.1/7.1.2/7.1.4/9.1/9.1.4/11.1.4) today's market should be more than able to cover every consumer's needs and requirements in regards to home audio. Still, when it comes to gaming things are not quite as simple, not just because well we'd all like something unique looking for our desks but also due to space limitations around that said desk most of us have experienced more than once in our lives. This is why Creative recently took their popular Katana V2 gaming soundbar series back to the drawing board to remove the bundled subwoofer from the mix and the somewhat recently released Katana SE model is the result.

   Creative is a worldwide leader in digital entertainment products. Famous for its Sound Blaster® sound cards and for driving the multimedia revolution - which established a user base of 400 million - Creative drives digital entertainment with cutting-edge audio solutions that include premium wireless speakers, wireless headphones, powerful audiophile-grade digital amplifiers and next-generation home-theatre systems. Aiming at the new mobile networked generation by bridging the worlds of the computer, smartphones, and tablets, Creative continues to reinvent the Sound Blaster, with its ground-breaking Sound Blaster Roar series and USB-audio class of products such as the Sound Blaster X7.

   Once again and exactly like their Katana V2 and Katana V2X gaming soundbars Creative has squeezed 4 drivers (2x109mm up firing mid-range/2x54mm front firing fabric dome tweeters resulting in a frequency range of 55–20000Hz), two amplifiers (90WRMS total and controlled by a multi-core DSP), and a 2.0/5.1 virtual surround sound audio card (Hi-Res 24bit/96KHz capable with Dolby Audio and X-Fi support), dual beamforming noise-cancelling microphones (allow the soundbar to also be used as a speakerphone). What's interesting in comparison (aside the lack of a subwoofer and its replacement by two passive bass radiators at the rear) is that the drivers of the new Katana SE have the same exact output of 90WRMS (25WRMs for each mid-range driver and 20WRMS for each tweeter) as the ones in the Katana V2X plus its subwoofer. Needless to say, Creative has placed an almost identical ARGB LED bar beneath the front of the soundbar (7 zones), the same front display and in regards to connectivity this includes Bluetooth v5.0 (support for A2DP/AVRCP and SBC audio codec), HDMI ARC port, optical port (SPDIF), 3.5mm AUX input, USB-C and a 3.5mm headset output. So, time to see what Creative has been up to and whether or not the Katana SE can actually rival its predecessors, even without a subwoofer.