The Bose Lifestyle® 8 Series II System is a product that offers a range of audio and video systems. It is designed to be beautiful in every way, with a focus on acoustics, aesthetics, craftsmanship, and simplicity. To identify your specific Bose model, locate the serial number and manufacturing date on the product, typically found on a label on the bottom or back of the device. The serial number is usually a combination of letters and numbers.
To connect your TV to your Bose, use an optical cable and connect other sources to the TV. The Lifestyle 38 has an optical input, and most modern TVs still have optical audio out, so you can connect the TV to the Bose with an optical cable and connect other sources to the TV.
To view the serial number on a connected TV, open the SoundTouch app, tap on the Menu icon in the upper-left, and select a system to view its details. The serial number can also be found on a connected TV.
For the Lifestyle home entertainment systems, the serial number is located at the bottom of the control console, near a barcode, and begins with the number 0. The VS-2 serial number can also be viewed from the system console.
There are about a dozen Lifestyle models available, and the serial number can be found on the label by the connections on the back of the bass module. To find your product, search by product name or serial number.
📹 BOSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO KNOW THIS!
The SECRETS that BOSE Won’t Tell You! Controversy, Conspiracy, and Cash. BOSE became famous in the 1970’s with their …
How can you tell the difference between QuietComfort 35 and 35 II?
The Bose QuietComfort 35 and 35 II are comparable in that they both feature a dedicated “Action button” for noise cancellation; however, the former lacks this functionality. The original QC35 was discontinued in 2018 with the release of the newer QC35 II model. The Bose QuietComfort 35 II was first made available for purchase on October 13, 2017, on Amazon.
How do I identify my Bose system?
To identify a headphones’ serial number, check the headband for a 4-digit code, remove the cushion to reveal the 17-digit serial number on the earcup, or look inside the battery compartment if the headphones use a rechargeable battery. The 4-digit code may be located on the earbud body or eartip, and the 17-digit serial number may be on the inside of the earcup. If the headphones use a rechargeable battery, remove the battery and look inside the battery compartment.
How do I tell which Bose quietcomfort I have?
The serial number of a Bose headset can be located in one of two places: beneath the scrim within the right earcup or in the upper-right corner when the headset is unfolded. The serial number commences with the digit “0.” To ascertain the serial number, one may utilize the Bose Connect application, which can be accessed via the Settings > Product Info section of the mobile device with which the product is connected.
Where do I find the model number on my Bose speaker?
The Bose Connect App represents the optimal means of ascertaining the serial number, which can be located within the Settings > Product Details section or on the bottom of the speaker.
Does Bose make lifestyle anymore?
Bose’s Lifestyle 600 and 650 systems were first introduced in 2016 and 2018, respectively, while the Lifestyle 550 was subsequently made available for international sale in 2018. The systems are equipped with four OmniJewel speakers, one horizontal center channel speaker, two wireless receivers, and two C7 “figure-8” power cords. Additionally, the Bass Module 700 is included with the systems.
Where can I find my Bose model?
In order to gain access to a particular mode on the headphones, it is necessary to set it as a favorite within the Bose app. This can be achieved by tapping on the “Modes” option, which can be found on the main screen. To navigate through the available modes, press and hold the multifunction button, which will announce each mode in a continuous loop.
Why is Bose Wave system discontinued?
The Acoustic Wave Music System II, released in 2006, was criticized for its high cost and lack of features compared to competitors. The line was discontinued in 2017. The Wave Radio, also known as Wave Radio I, was an AM/FM clock radio introduced in 1993, smaller than the Acoustic Wave Music System and featuring two 2. 5-inch speakers. A “Wave Radio/CD” model was introduced in 1998, essentially a Wave Radio I with a CD player. The Wave Radio could also function as an alarm clock radio, featuring two independent alarms.
The Wave Radio II was introduced in 2005, based on the Wave Music System without a CD player, using a dual tapered waveguide and revised speakers. The Wave Radio III was introduced in 2007, identical to the Wave Radio II but added a Radio Data System (RDS) and a large snooze button.
How do I know if I have Bose 35 or 45?
The Bose QuietComfort 35 II and QC 45 headphones have distinct multi-function and playback buttons, with the QC 35 II having an action button that cycles between noise canceling modes. The QC 45 has an Aware mode toggle, which amplifies external noises through the headphones to keep users aware of their surroundings. The QC 35 II remains competitive due to software updates through the proprietary app. The QC 45 has redesigned ear pads with a smoother finish than the previous headset.
Both headphones have sturdy plastic headbands and can be rotated to lay flat against a table or folded into a protective case. Both headphones have a water-resistant rating, but the QC 35 II and QC 45 have a proprietary app for software updates.
How do I know if I have QC35 or qc45?
The Bose QuietComfort 35 II and QC 45 headphones have distinct multi-function and playback buttons, with the QC 35 II having an action button that cycles between noise canceling modes. The QC 45 has an Aware mode toggle, which amplifies external noises through the headphones to keep users aware of their surroundings. The QC 35 II remains competitive due to software updates through the proprietary app. The QC 45 has redesigned ear pads with a smoother finish than the previous headset.
Both headphones have sturdy plastic headbands and can be rotated to lay flat against a table or folded into a protective case. Both headphones have a water-resistant rating, but the QC 35 II and QC 45 have a proprietary app for software updates.
What is the difference between Bose Lifestyle 38 and 48?
The Lifestyle 38 and 48 systems have intelligent music storage capabilities, with the 48 storing 340 hours and the 38 storing 200. The uMusic technology, an “intelligent playback system”, ranks music based on one’s listening habits, similar to TiVo. It connects artists using built-in databases like Gracenote CD Database and AllMusic Guide, learning musical tastes quickly. The VS-1 Video Expander, sold as an accessory for Series II or III DVD Lifestyle systems, adds three more video inputs (3 Component, S-Video, and Composite) and either Component, S-Video, or Composite out to the TV. This allows the system to up-convert video signals to deliver the highest quality signal and simplifies switching to a “one-button” process.
What is speaker model number?
The serial and model numbers of speaker systems can be located on the subwoofer of multi-channel systems or on the back of the speaker unit in the case of stereo systems. In the event that these locations are not available, the numbers can be found on the packaging boxes.
📹 Setting up your Bose® Lifestyle® System
As a classical musician, I had a funny experience when a Bose salesman tried to convince me that the opening “turntable rumble” of the recording I had brought in of Strauss’s “Also Sprach Zarathustra” was completely eliminated by the “superior” 901s. It definitely WAS eliminated BUT (ahem… too bad that “rumble” is supposed to be a 16hz/32Hz organ pedal low C….) LOL.
Oh I remember setting up so many Bose Acoustimass speaker systems for Home Theater customers. It always pained me greatly to have to look the customer in the face while outright lying to them about how wonderful their new overpriced system sounded. Complete and utter junk! Thanks for another great article.
Back in the day Bose was being introduced in the restaurant and disco market in Finland and I came across many of their speakers that looked like the 901, but had two ports in the front, while I was installing better audio equipment to a venue. I was curious and inspected the setup that always required a preamp between the main amp and say, a mixer. It turned out that the preamp actually was a fixed equalizer with a hard cut somewhere around 50-60 Hz. Why was that? Well, inspecting the speaker itself I found out that Bose had figured a new business model for building speakers with cheap components. They sourced small mid range speakers by the tens of thousands bringing the price down to a minimum and made a speaker cabinet with 8 pcs of those acquiring a modest power handling of say, 8 x 20-30W = 160-240W with the condition that the frequency range was kept above 60 Hz. The bass sound was created by peaking (amplifying) the 80-120 Hz range just before the cut off at 60 Hz. This makes it sound like there is good bass when there really isn’t any. In other words Bose was misusing his scientific knowledge to fool the customers. And it worked. 😁
I was a technician in the 80s. I was at an audio store listening to the 1812 overture with canon, on a set of Klipsch corner horns. The salesman said, “Listen to this”, and hit the switch for the Bose 901s. There was a squeek. Then nothing. He switched back to the Klipsch and said there must be something wrong with the switch panel. Later that week I went out to lunch with a tech friend of mine. He told me the story of a set of Bose 901s he had in the shop that had every driver toasted. I asked if they were from Team Electronics. He said, yes, how did you know? We had a good laugh!
Just as important, and perhaps even more important than the technology Bose was developing, was the army battalion sized legal team that aggressively pursued their patents. Bose was well known for taking an existing technology and tweaking it just a bit and then slapping a patent on it. A good example of this is the Bose Wave radio. Anyone with experience in speaker building could recognize what is essentially a Helmholtz Resonator, but because it used plastic tubing wrapped around a radio receiver in an active system, voila’! There’s your ‘Wave’ patent. And this was a frequent occurrence. Bose was also notorious when it came to hiding specifications. It was marketed as a luxury brand at a high price, but was manufactured with cheap materials and cut corners everywhere possible. My friend has a pair of 901’s that he has loved ever since buying them in the 80’s, but I think he might still be compensating for how much he paid for them with stands and the optional EQ. To this day, I’ve never bought anything from Bose and never plan on doing so. There’s nothing they do that someone else isn’t already doing with better build quality and a lower price.
Once upon a time, I visited a Bose outlet store in NH USA. One product caught my attention, a ‘bookshelf’ stereo system. I read the price as $349.99, and thought that it was just a bit overpriced. I got closer, and then realized that the price was actually $3,499.99. Crikey, the speakers must have cones made of unicorn hymens. So I popped one of the speaker covers off, and while a sales clerk was leaping over furniture to reach me, I determined by inspection that the speaker cone was made of plain old paper (i.e. cardboard). Yeah… $3500 and cardboard speaker cones. Nutzoid. What a racket. Their customers must be empty headed.
I hated the Profit margin that Bose insisted on working on. All R & D. The sound was good at reproducing mid-range. Never quite found they had the high-end sound I was looking for, or the low end. A lot of money for a midrange speaker. Friends with the 901s and the 501s. Not impressed with the sound. My brother-in-law knew that I was the electronics guy in the family. They left it in my hands to pick out all the audio equipment for his New home. After shopping, comparing, having everything shipped to his home and did the installation on my own. His wife was not happy the equipment. Telling me everything was big. Especially the speakers. They were shopping size not sound. Never made sense to me. They had plenty of room. Ended up with a Bose system, I don’t know what they did with what I purchased for them. I believe in name brand only. High-wattage amplifiers, if the room is possible the bigger the speaker the better. I was using a total of 4 15in woofers, 2 horn 4×10 mid range. 8 tweeters. Carver, Crown, Altec Lansing, JBL, Techniques, Teac, Pioneer. That was the equipment I was using. Almost forgot. I was using a pair of Audio-Technica speakers when I didn’t want to run the big equipment. They had 10in woofers that would be down-firing. A mid-range and a tweeter that were front-firing. I had to send a way for the stands as they were small. In height.
I remember, back in the early 2000’s being keen on getting an Acoustimass home theater system. I listened to a demo (in a normal room, not a specially setup one) and felt that it was….ok. Then I listened to a demo of the Energy Take 5.1. At half the price (including a Yamaha surround receiver) it just flat out-performed the Bose system. It’s what I ended up leaving with instead.
This was hands down the best history of Bose products and their marketing strategy that I have ever seen. Bravo. I briefly owned a floor standing Bose 501 in 1973 but soon after traded it in on a pair of JBL L26 Decade Speakers. During the 80’s and 90’s, I briefly had a “business” with a friend of mine when every wife was hounding their husbands with “when are you going to get rid of those gargantuan speakers you got in college in the 70’s and get one of those Bose Satellite/Subwoofer Systems”? I went to countless garage sales and during that period bought close to 40 Advent/JBL/AR/Cerwin Vega products and then refinished the cabinets and would have them refoamed if necessary. Most we sold on EBay but finding boxes suitable for shipment became an issue. I had a fellow who did all my refoaming for me and he once exclaimed: “have you ever looked inside a Bose 901 speaker. Literally a bowl of spaghetti wire.” Needless to say, one of my least favorite speakers to take on as a “resale” project. Please do a similar “seminar” on JBL’s golden hour: the 1970’s. My favorite? The L50. Similar to an L100 Century but with a 10 inch foam surround woofer and a “real” grill. I even prefer them to the venerable L166 Horizon.
Ah Bose… My granddad (the man behind a certain audio firm now widely associated with big blue wattmeters) knew him and eh, pretty much despised him. There were two people who could cause my grandfather to utter profanity in conversation – FDR, and Amar Bose. He considered referring to Bose as a snake oil salesman to be a slander against snake oil salesmen.
I went to a few Bose presentations some decades ago. The Acoustimass AM5 was the first sometime in the late 80’s and my teenage mind was absolutely blown away by the glorious sound coming from these tiny cubes and subwoofer. I sang praises of Bose until I started working in car audio straight out of high school, which is when I learned that the Bose systems in GM and Nissan cars were utter bunk compared to what I could put together for much less than the Bose options cost using JBL speakers and Rockford or Kenwood amps. But, surely Bose was still “audiophile quality” in the home arena, right? Bose wowed me again right before heading off to college with their powered Roommate II speakers which were a dead ringer for their quite ubiquitous 101 bookshelf speakers, but with an amplifier in them. In those days they were still expensive for me (just over $300 back in 1990) so I could only dream of having a pair. That changed in 1991 when a guy down the hall from me in the dorms showed up with a pair of Paradigm Atom speakers and an old Aiwa receiver after Christmas break. Everyone on my floor were stunned at how good those little bookshelf speakers sounded. It was to the point where I hopped into my car and drove to the nearest department store with Roommates so I could have a listen: They couldn’t hold a candle to the Paradigm speakers. Many moons later and I wound up owning both: I picked up the Roommates in ’94 and got the Paradigm Atom speakers (an original set) around 2000. I’ve since A/B’ed them and, yeah.
I remember going into a Bose brick and mortar store and sitting through one of their presentations where you going to a room and hear this phenomenal sound coming from these great looking speakers; and then what they do is lift those great looking speakers up in the air to show these little cubes which are actually producing the sound. Then, of course, a sales rep would try to sell you a $5,000 acoustimass system that, if I bought it, would replace the $2,000 system I already had that sounded terrific. Now we know those rooms were actually heavily equalized and acoustically treated in order to get that sound. That means that what Bose could have done is to sell acoustic treatment packages along with their products. Of course, that would kill their recall program, but I think it might have also advanced home audio appreciation in general; as a public would have finally discovered that the best way to improve the sound of their systems (whatever that system might have been) was to improve the sound of their listening spaces.
Dreamed of getting “everything Bose” when I first heard the 901s back in the 70s, peer pressured into being the “best” ever. Fast forward to the 80s, joined the Navy. Got the Acoustimass AM5 at my base exchange when it first came out. Bose expanded their speaker models going into the 90s, got the 601s, 301s and a Bose center speaker for my 5.1 setup at the time along with a sub from another brand (forgot what) and a Pioneer A/V receiver. Now retired and along the way I have read and researched about other audio components and such and took off my blinders away from the overpriced Bose products. I now own a much “simpler” 7.1 setup for a fraction of the price of that old 5.1 Bose configuration. A refurbished Denon AVR S760H A/V receiver, Jamo Studio Series 803 5.0 system speakers, Polk bookshelves for heights and an F1 BIC America sub. I’m no audiophile but it sounds just fine to me. With emphasis on TO ME.
Back in the ’70s, after weeks of speaker shopping, I finally settled on the IMF TLS80. My dealer had a pair of Bose 901s set up in the same room, and just for the heck of it, I did A/B comparisons on them both. I figured the IMFs would sound a little better, since they were about twice the price. But, I was surprised how big the difference was. The IMFs were detailed and dynamic, while the Bose sounded mushy and smeared. Ever since then, I’ve had a strong dislike for Bose, and it reminded me of a comment I once heard: “No highs, no lows, must be Bose.”
I met Amar Bose and his wife on a service call as a technician for his satellite tv system at his Hawaii house high up on a ridge looking down over Honolulu in 2004. It was between thanksgiving and Christmas. Very nice guy. I told him I owned a pair of the QC2 headphones for the long flight over the pacific. He then Told me about the noise canceling headphones idea he came up with in the 1970’s but had to wait until tech caught up to make it small enough to fit in portable headsets. But used it in helicopters for years waiting for the QC line to come to fruition. As I was leaving standing in their foyer his wife goes in that kind old lady voice “Amar did you give him his Christmas present yet”. I chimed in being on the clock we were not allowed to receive gifts. He said nonsense walk over to a closet by the front door opened it and stacked from floor to ceiling were boxes of the QC2 head phones. He reached in grabbed one turned and said here merry Christmas. Holding a $300 pair of brand new Bose QC2 headphones and being on the clock not allowed to take gifts I kindly said thank you and left with the box in hand.
In 1970 me & a friend went to a consumer products hi fi show & went to the Bose room & after the demonstration we asked if he could turn up the volume on them & he wouldn’t do it, so we went back after everybody left and turned on the tape he was playing, slowly turned up the volume & those things sounded like they were gonna explode! Just distorted all over the place-terrible
I still have 3 or 4 Acoustimass systems. Even after trying all the offerings from Klipsch, SVS, Bowers & Wilkins, Etc. A properly setup Acoustimass system with a sufficient amount of juice running through them is hard to beat when you can keep cranking the volume without any clipping or distortion. Have been using one in my upstairs system and it’s wild how loud it can get while staying clean and composed. Bose haters keep the prices down and my music up! ✅🍿 Still love my other speakers as well but Bose is hard to beat for what it is imo.
Same years ago we had dinner with friends who wanted to show off their brand new Acoustimass system. We suffered through a movie where even though they turned the volume up to uncomfortable levels, we couldn’t understand the dialog. A couple of months later we had them over for dinner and watched a movie in our dedicated home theater with a calibrated 7.1 audio system. They were astounded at the clarity of dialog and the overall quality of sound, even at comfortable listening levels. I then hurt their feelings by telling them I’d actually spent less on the speakers than they did.
Yes, done very well. I remember when Bose created separated demo display areas in stores away from the retailers soundrooms, to focus on the marketing message and to lessen the chance of direct A/B comparisons with other brands. The AM5 rollout was also full of stage tricks, they created a light cloth covered frame to emulate a big speaker only to have a pair of AM5 upper modules sitting inside the cloth. Again away from anywhere direct comparisons were available. Later when the cubes and bass modules were incorporated into our sound rooms and displayed against their direct competing sub-sat systems, they were the blown away by just about everything else on the shelves…All smoke and mirrors. So sad. I recall my old soundrooms and having 301s, 501s, 601s comparing to other brands, and as a serious pro and enthusiast of good audio, those speakers actually did sound good, compared well to the other marquee brands we had in the rooms. Bose DOES know how to build good product. But the insane profit margins and ease of manufacturing of the acoustimass line just really completely diverted the company away from what we call ‘ hi-fi ‘..
“No highs, no lows .. it must be Bose! ” Retired hifi guy here and that’s what was said when Bose was brought up as a serious speaker. Bose was known for spending more on marketing/advertising than any other speaker manufacturer by a wide margin. Perceived performance due to marketing hype and many unscrupulous and likely paid for glowing reviews and write‐ups in every genre of magazine from Popular Mechanics to Playboy. Small full range drivers firing in all directions caused the sound to reflect back to the listener at different time delays and some in reverse phase from the original signal. Many people find this to feel like sound is coming from all around them and were easily impressed by this simple psycho-acoustic technique. It is soon found to be just not tonally accurate with a non defined stereo image when compared to quality designs from the likes of Thiel, that he mentioned, and most other quality speakers using the traditional design approach of front firing only stereo drivers. Our goal was to reduce unwanted and out of phase reflections and charged accordingly for proper wall treatments to absorb, diffuse, or a combo of both. This is the same technique used today for better 2 website listening as well as full home theater walls built with different materials and thicknesses to the point of an entire room framed with an air gap between two walls (room built inside another room) for the best results . Fun times! Enjoy whatever sounds good to you, NOT what someone else says you will like !
Hi. I’m an Australian 62 year old gay guy and DJ and an Audio/Visual Engineer. I started spinning at a club but before I did I was horified at the way it was set up. They were using an Amcron DC300 for the treble and an under powered amp for the bass. I said to the owner that this was a failure waiting to happen. I removed all the rubbish from the console and started on a re-install of the equipment. All the processors and amps were taken off of the rack and blown clean of dust using compressed air. I looked at both amps and replaced the fuse holder in the Amcron wondering how it had not shorted to ground. I vacuumed the DJ booth and started reinstalling from the start. First was the limiter which I just set to limit in real time with a quick fast attack and decay. I rewired the 15 inch JBLs to the Amcron from the electronic cross over and the 4 BOSE 802s to the other amp as well as wiring the active BOSE processor to the input of the other amp. Luckily, someone had used a terminal strip to connect them and after a phase check, I wired them back in for good.The BOSE processor was just a way to feed the upper frequencies to the 802s. Once I had checked it was all working, I killed the 25 and 30 HZ on the graphic because 60 HZ is where the bottom end started really. After a few tweaks and adjusting the processors and the graphic EQ it actually had some really good grunt.I ran it hard after finding a fan to keep the gear cool for about 2 hours. I screwed some clear PVC over the gear with a warning not to touch the settings.
I used to have a pair of Bose 6.2 (like 301s on steroids). They were OK. The .2 series is probably the best series Bose ever made. I eventually replaced them with a pair of vintage Dynaco A25XL. No comparison. I got rid of the 6.2. The A25XLs are magical with my old Pioneer SX720. On the other hand, I use Bose’s A20 noise-cancelling aviation headset at work. They are absolutely awesome. I was able to compare directly with other brands of aviation headsets and they are the absolute best in noise-cancelling and comfort.
I remember my parents finally getting a stereo of their dreams in the 1970s It was a set of Bose 901 series II speakers driven by a Pioneer reciever, they had a nice turn table and a flash cassette player to go with it. I just remember it was the loudest and clearest stereo I heard for many years, though the sound stage was never one of its strong points. It did make me a bit fussy about audio though. When looking for my own stereo and AV system components I did a lot of looking, that original system was a benchmark. Thing is I never ended up with Bose speakers, never even close. I heard lots of speakers that were worse but, there were always speakers that were better at a better price.
I had a love affair with the Bose AM5 back in the early 90’s. I thought they were the best thing after listening to one at a friends place so had to run out and buy a set. I always thought wow how can such a small speaker system handle up to 200 watts (RMS) per website as stated on the bass unit. It wasn’t until I upgraded my amplifier to a unit at 100w per website that I started noticing some kind of serious sound compression and the bass would flatten when I cranked the amp up. So I opened the bass unit, played some music and all of sudden this crazy light started emanating from the circuit. WTF? It was then I realised Bose deploys a current limiter to protect the speakers which obviously aren’t rated up to 200w. In reality I was only really getting around 50-65 watts of power into the speakers (depending on the music) before the protection circuit would cut in. Love affair over. I ended up giving them away.
Bose is trash. They couldn’t even get their Sleepbuds to not drain power 24/7 even when not being used. Even in the second gen and a recall of the first gen for battery drain issues. Super basic stuff. I was gifted a Bose portable smart speaker. It costs twice what my JBL Bluetooth speaker costs, yet the battery life of the Bose is a third of the JBL and the audio is so muddy by comparison, it’s a joke. There are cheap Chinese no brand speakers that sounds better and cost less than a tenth as much. Bose has never been good quality but the last decade or so, it’s gotten so bad that I have no idea how they aren’t bankrupt.
I have a pair of Bose 501 ser. 2. I got them cheep and refoamed the main speaker in each cabinet. I love the low end they provide. I also have a pair of Klipsch RP-600R II’s as well. These bring out the mids and high’s the Bose are lacking. Personally these two speakers together make for a great sound in my front room. So I have old and new speaker technology in my stereo system. By the way. I power my system with a Pioneer SA-7500 II amp from 1977. Works just fine for my listening pleasure.
I’ve had some Bose products over the years, 141s and 161s in my early experimental days, then a set of Acoustimass 3 on stands driven by a quality stereo receiver (they actually did decent imaging – ! – when carefully set up), and some 402s and MB4s as PA speakers. I have more serious speakers, but the Bose speakers are fun to play with every so often. Don’t let anyone look down on a speaker for using paper cones; virtually all PA speakers currently made, even the high-end ones (JBL, Meyer, Nexo, Renkus, etc.) are using paper cones, because even though paper is not the strongest possible cone material, it has the highest tensile strength to weight ratio, and this produces the most efficient conversion of electrical signal to sound output.
When Bose ruined the QC35 headphone noise canceling with a firmware update so they could sell more of the new 700 model headphones and then lied about it to their customers on their website forums and THEN completely removed all forums on their website to stop the complaints I was done buying their products.
I went to a BOSE shop in Birmingham UK a few years ago. I wanted to try out their noise-cancelling headphones. The guy selling them tried to convince me that normally “this is what the headphones sound like before the cancelling feature is switched on”. I immediately noticed that he had switched on the ambient microphones built in to the headphones and they were actually piping more ambient sound through the phones into my ears. So I switched the whole thing completely off. This made the headphones behave like proper ear muffs, cutting out a lot of the outside sound. So it seemed like a con to me. When I questioned it, the salesman became agitated and sheepish. So on with the demo. All it was doing, was taking continuous ambient tones and inverting them to pipe to the phones as positive and negative waves to phase cancel drones and easily predictable noises out of the experience. They did nothing for random short sounds like peoople talking. Remember how BOSE used to advertise these headphones as though they cancel the sound out on airplanes, especially the engine hum? Well that’s ALL they cancel. People buy these headphones to cancel out babies crying in the cabin etc. Nope. Sorry, that won’t work.
I had a pair of the orignial 901s but they represented a big drop in audio quality from my previous AR3as. But the effect was very cool, so I sucked in like many. A friend bought a pair and took them apart. He found the exact same nine speakers ($3.29 each) from a wholesale catalog and built the boxes to match so he had two pair. Cost less than $100. Identical sound as far as we could tell (McIntosh electronics, Thorens/SME table). Over the years, it has been hard to ignore all the store demo rooms with really crappy sound for thousands. Amar may have been a good physicist but couldn’t tell a flute from a clarinet.
The Bose AM series are what I called “well-engineered” speakers. “Well-engineered” in that they were designed to appeal to a target market, and they did so very successfully. A casual inspection of two of the AM5 bass modules showed me that Bose did not waste any money on features that would not make a difference to the target market. The bass drivers used in the modules look cheap because, doh, they’re in the bass module – who’s going to be looking at them? Several years ago, my aunt’s Bose Lifestyle system failed, and while they were looking for a replacement, I lent them my retuned Mordaunt-Short speakers and a DIY subwoofer that IMO would run rings around one of the AM systems in terms of sonic accuracy. She couldn’t wait to replace them with a new Bose system. Turns out that being able to get speakers and their stands off the floor and replace them with tiny hidden modules mounted near the roof was more important to her than sonic accuracy, and I think Bose realized that most of their target market probably thought the same way.
I purchased two new pair of Bose 901 series IV speakers around 1981. I wired them to 4 ohms. Powered by a Pioneer SX-1080 and coupled with to a Technics 3300 turntable. Hung from the ceiling per Bose parameters in a hard 25 x 25 foot basement the four-speaker system continues to perform admirably especially when cranked in a party atmosphere. Mostly Classic ’60’s and ’70’s rock. Although other types of music play well also. Direct to Disc albums at high volumes are especially ear and mind blowing. Never clipping or failures. The only issue with the speakers is that I had to install new surrounds about ten years ago. Other than that this will continue to be my forever system.
When I was younger, and looking to build my audio system, I looked at Bose. I considered both the 901 and Acoustimass products. I ended up with Martin Logan Sequel II speakers. I paid more for the Martin Logans, but have never regretted that choice. If you buy the best, you’ll never regret that you settled for less. It is now 2023. I am out of the game. I no longer know what’s good and what’s not. I still have those Martin Logans. They still sound great. 30 years later, and my ears can no longer hear the capability of those speakers, though those speakers are still reproducing sound as well as they ever did.
Maybe 10 years ago I went into a Bose store in an outlet mall. I entered to win their home theater system and 09I listened to it. At first it sounded pretty good. As I listened longer it seemed there wasn’t a lot of solid bass. I asked about connecting a sub to the system. They didn’t have an output for one. The whole system was limited. I didn’t win either.
My dad gave me his system he bought in 1970… a McIntosh set MC 2505 and MX114 and a set of the first Bose 901 speakers. I refurbed both McIntosh units and are now working in my current set up. The Bose speakers are still in storage. I don’t have the interest to refoam the 18 speakers for average weird sound quality. I also don’t have the heart to tell my dad I don’t like them, as he is one of the original Bose lifetime customers to this day. Always getting the latest system, bless his heart!
I always thought of Bose as a 80% speaker, they cover 80% of the audio spectrum, which for 80% of the listening market is 100% enough. And there is nothing wrong with that, let the market dictate product design, in that way, Bose was very smart. Full disclosure, I don’t like their sound myself, but respect the design work that went into them.
Awesome capture of what Bose was and is. I remember the sale tactics of Bose just as you described it. I am not a Bose fan. This started when they would not help me with my Nissan Maxima Bose stereo system which would produce a large shrieking noise every time I turned it on and their CD player would get very hot. I end up ditching the whole system for an Alpine. Love your reviews, especially your knowledge of Audio equipment. If I ever come to your shop, I probably will spend hours drooling on just about every system you have there. Thank You for very informative articles.
I was always under the impression that Bose had the best sound in the industry. I heard some speakers that seemed to have great website separation and sound bouncing. I always envied people who had their headphones, but I just couldn’t justify paying so much for their products. This summer I was determined to treat myself. I went into a couple of Best Buy’s to demo their S1 Pro speakers against others. This time I was going to get the Bose, but the UE Hyperboom kicked its butt with sound quality AND separation for a fraction of the price. Not what I expected. Got the Hyperboom. Still Boseless.
I’ve NEVER heard a consumer level Bose product that sounded musical. I did however utilize Bose Professional RoomMatch line array boxes and PowerMatch amps for a large commercial installation. That system is unbelievable even by today’s standards. Even the reps for the competing systems who lost out made comments as to how impressed they were. One of them even stated that if Bose ever managed to get a firm grip on the Pro market that his company (one of the top three in the world of pro audio) would go broke.
I’ve got a ridiculously complicated chain feeding my Bose 901 Series V and an ideal placement facing an exposed brick wall. These speakers absorb endless amounts of power and really do show their best when using a muscular amp, even at low levels. I sort of Dr. Frankenstein’d my own monster amp with a vintage Sony STC 7000 feeding a vintage Crown MacroTech 1200 (which is astonishing in terms of clarity and control) for an easy 310 per website into 8 ohms. I use a Pine Tree Audio passive single ended to balanced converter to handle the RCA out from the preamp to the XLR in on the amp. (Jensen transformers handle the conversion in that box and act as a natural Bessel filter.) I replaced the original active EQ with a DSP unit from Deer Creek Audio. (I A/B tested them when I received the DSP from Deer Creek and it definitely sounds better. Better clarity, better dynamics.) The 901s are not the last word in detail and resolution, but the sound stage and involvement is incredible. When no one else is home and you want to crank it up, they deliver smiles all day. I’ve been collecting and swapping gear for a long time, and I’d always been curious about the 901s, so when a nice set came along and I had the money in my pocket I went for it, just for fun. Now, they look so great in the living room that my wife won’t consider approving any other speakers at this point, so the mission has been to make them sound as good as possible (and to put cool looking systems in other rooms!) Anyway, I really like your website!
Back in 1998, I was getting a huge bonus from work and decided to spend a couple grand of it on a stereo system. I walked into a place and was totally sold on the Bose Lifestyle surround system (add 1998 model number here). Thankfully, the bonus was delayed and I kept checking out other systems, but still really liked the Bose one. Then, this is back when there wasn’t much on the Internet, someone gave me the best advice ever when it came to choosing a stereo system at the time…. bring your own CDs of what you like to listen to. Holy crap! Everything I played of my own sounded terrible on the Bose system. They had really cherry picked songs that sounded great on their system for their CD in their device, everything else sounded terrible. It wasn’t just a little difference, everything other than the music Bose had picked out sounded terrible. I ended up getting a Yamaha system with Energy speakers for less money that sounded 100 times better than the Bose system. (Energy was great at the time, but went downhill shortly after.) So, while I don’t hate Bose, I just don’t think it is worth the money. (Just like Apple products.)
Great History story. I remember selling Bose products. I never owned anything carrying a Bose label, but customers came in wanting them. I never lied about them. I just explained the differences as you went up the Bose price line and let the customer convince themselves with the volume control. One interesting thing I heard was when Amar was a professor at a prestigious university and he owned a speaker company. He had research done at a very low cost. College students worked cheap. I wonder if they got grades rather than patents.
Been using Bose products for over 40 years. Still using Bose in my home theatre and with some of my musical instruments (they sound great). I’ve never had a problem with any of them. I’m using 3 other, different types of speakers (all brand names) and the Bose sound still rules. If the price is in your budget; you like the sound and it makes you happy, buy it. Screw the reviews and enjoy YOUR sound.
The only thing worse then a Bose speaker is a Bose fanboy. It’s unbeliveable how many of them think they have the best thing on the market – and have NEVER even tried something else. I grew up listening to a pair of 601s (was playing music on them since I remember being alive, like age 4 or 5) and I worked at a hi-fi shop when Acoustimass 3 & 5 came out. Literally EVEYTHING ELSE in the shop sounded better, regardless of price – but we had some good brands there. Anyways. This is probably the best BOSE article out there. Well done.
When I sold hifi in the early 1980’s, a critic of their products once told me, “No highs no lows… it must be Bose.” After listening to the 901s back to back with some Snell Acoustics and Polk Audio systems we had in the store, I had to agree. You’ve pegged it: it was hard to beat their combined marketing and legal strategies.
I bought a pair of Bose speakers on consignment. my plan was to accentuate my Polk Audio Monitor 10s. I My Yamaha receiver did not allow me to adjust the volume of both speaker. I am not kidding, My Polks were so efficient that I had to put my ear next to the raised speaker before I could hear them. I brought them back for a prearranged buy back if l . The only speaker that came close was the Klipsh Heresy, but it lack the polks and l was unable to adjust the brassy tone. I bought my polks in 1982 and still used them until they were stolen. I am on your side mate, Bose should have cut their advertising budget abd instead buy decent sound designers and higher quality components. I fell for the hype like everyone else, but I would rather look at the Klipsh Chorus if l was to trade up, or graow some balls and build a pair of la Scalas.
Nothing beats a dedicated stereo loudspeakers and an integrated amplifier. Be it standmounters or floorstanders. Proper stereo imaging is the key. Not some multiple drivers placed in awkward position aimed to reflect, deflect and direct sound waves. Hoping to make the sound big for its size. It just doesn’t sound good because our room varies a lot. That’s why I sold all my bose smart speakers and went back to traditional good old stereo speakers and subwoofer.
I used to own Bose cinemate system and it sounded great specially if understand how sound travels in your room. No I didn’t had room acoustics on my living room but I knew for the surround effect to work I needed strategically use the walls in my room . It was the most organized, better sounding sound system I ever owned.
I remember when I worked at Circuit City in 1997 we had a listening room that was only supposed to have Bose in it. I put a JBL Simply Cinema SCS120 system that blew the Bose out of the water in terms of both clarity and dynamic, it’s key features being the larger satellites and self powered subwoofer. Our Bose rep found out, since the JBL out sold the Bose Acoustimass 100 series II by 5 to 1, and threatened to pull Bose from every Circuit City in the region and possibly the country if we didn’t take the JBL out of the room. Since Bose didn’t have a brick and mortar store, we dared them to do so. I Since CC eventually went belly up years afterward, not sure who truly won that, but it felt good to have both my store and my regional bosses back me up.
Could you do one on the Bose professional line?….just as controversial among musicians. I admit that I was a skeptic regarding their personal amplification systems until I actually tried one and found that they delivered as good as promised while being much more compact and lighter than other PA systems.
The main thing I’ve heard about Bose speakers from everyone was how great they were, albeit pricey. I finally had a chance to hear a home theatre system with Bose components and I must say, I was thoroughly unimpressed. I noticed even after calibration, the soundstage had a severe “sweet spot” and that drove me crazy. Plus, I noticed it couldn’t produce accurate bass tones and the highs sounded rather strained. I guess I wasn’t the target audience for Bose speakers because I want to believe I’m hearing actual instruments, not a recording, and Bose couldn’t do that for me.
For decades I played live music through my Bose L1M2 pa system, thousands of shows…. Being a pro musician I made my living off my ears. It was the best sounding pa system Ive ever used and ever heard for solo live performance and I could play at lower levels and reach large crowds up to 500 people or so. The thing I most loved is I heard what my audience heard as the pa system sat behind me, and the sound level was almost exactly the same at the stage and at the back of the venue, meaning everyone heard the same thing I was hearing on the stage. Once I hooked into some dirty power at a venue and fried all of my pa components, Bose replaced the entire $3.600. pa system for less than $300. and it was wayyyy out of warranty. They also shipped out my new pa before I even had time to box up my old broken pa. If I was still playing live shows I would still be using my Bose pa system. On the other side of things, I absolutely hate their car audio products.
Back in the day, I installed a set of AM-3 Series II speakers in my BMW. The two satellites velcroed in place on top of the dash, and the sub strapped in the back seat with the seat belt. It sounded awesome! Before that, I drove around with a pair of Cerwin Vega AT-40s in the back seat (a little less practical, obviously).
I cannot count the number of failed Bose systems I have ripped and replaced from GM’s and Nissans over the years I worked in mobile audio. The repair costs were just too high, and a lack of schematics killed us… With very few exceptions, for less than the cost of getting a single Bose head unit repaired (Had to send it off) in a Maxima in the 90’s, we could swap in a high-end AM/FM/CD and cassette unit, and R&R all the speakers with really good aftermarket, and the diver was like, “This is mountains better the the factory system!”
As a retired repair tech who worked for a music store, I used to have to work on the Bose 802 along with other products. I hated working on the 802 due to the way they were made. first, all 8 of the speakers were 1 ohm speakers wired in series with some extra crossover thrown in the mix. There was no cabinet back so each speaker had to be removed from the front making service difficult. If one speaker developed an intermittent voice coil all of the speakers would cut out. This made finding the bad one a pain since there was no back to remove. You couldn’t just jump around the speakers to locate the bad one. You wound up pulling the speakers out the front until you figured out which one was bad. The crossover they used was stupidly designed. As I recall, for the boosted highs they had a small size crossover cap that jumpered across 6 of the speakers throwing all of the highs on 2 of the speakers. This meant that for those high notes, the amp was driving those speakers at a 2-ohm load instead of an 8-ohm load. They also used another cap across some of the speakers to further change the characteristics of the speaker system. Again no back to to remove in order to get to the crossover caps. If all of that was not enough you were to use their special Bose processer ( which was a preset equalizer) to make it all sound good.
I want a pulsating spear! When I used to go to symphony, I usually had pretty good seats. But one time, all that were available were WAY in the back, under the second balcony. When I was seated there, I finally understood what the 901 experience was all about — it sounded EXACTLY like that. (My Magnepans, and then my Apogees, on the other hand, did a very good job of recreating 7th row center.)
I really liked 901s when I heard them in 1980. A few years later my parents were looking to get a sound system professionally installed in their house that features a large open floor-plan (kitchen, living room, dining room). My dad was upset that the estimate came in at well over $5,000. I told him my opinion about Bose speakers and suggested he try out a pair of the shelf sized ones. One in the NE corner and one in the NW corner of the open area were more than enough to give great sound coverage to the whole open area. He was very happy with them and they are serving still 40+ years later. About 10 years ago my sister bought me one of their mini blur-tooth speakers and I’m still using it today.
In the 90s, I sold Bose at a high-end audio/video store. Bose would not tell us any specs for their products and would not allow us to demo them on the same wall as any other brands. Nevertheless, we had an adjoining wall in which we had our next-worse speakers hooked up (Boston Acoustics’ CR series (squawky and inferior to their earlier, HD series)). Many customers were shocked by how much better these speakers sounded than the Bose speakers. We could not sell Bose to anyone who compared them to our other systems, and we eventually had to drop their products. While upgrading my college degree, I later worked selling home electronics for Sears, which carried the Bose 3-2-1 system. Every 3-2-1 I sold was returned. Customers were shocked by how much better the cheap Kenwood system we sold sounded in their homes.
I purchased a Panamera in 2014 and ticked the Bose option box. It was the worst mistake I ever made; the audio “dynamics” sounded impressive for a short while, until you really started listening. The low and high ends discrepancies became so mind-numbingly jarring, I couldn’t live with the car anymore and sold it after 9 months.
I remember being young and hearing a “vintage” Bose speaker and being amazed. Then I studied physics and became an acoustician and sound system tuner and I cant tolerate them or their methods in business practice. It was great in my opinion in the past and then it just went to the deep end, the cost does not justify the quality or performance. Great vid
The Series VI 901 was definitely their best effort, and could be a fun speaker to listen to when properly set up with a ton of power. The EQ was best in a “loop” circuit on your receiver, pre, or integrated. Connecting between the pre and amp was not the best scenario. If you need to sweeten the treble, leave your pre set to flat, and use the Bose EQ treble slider; this will give you a better S/N ratio.
I remember when the 901’s were THE speaker to own. At the time they sounded amazing. Many years later I bought a pair and compared them to my Studio monitors. I couldn’t hear any difference. In my experience a pair of Bose has a sound that you either like or don’t. They heavily color the sound and if you hate it there’s little you can do about it. When I got into surround it was the SE-5 system.
Forget Bose. Buy a couple of Klipsch diffuser and a transistor (no MOSFET) 500+500 Wrms power amplifier. Bipolar transistors, unlike MOSFET, have a marked saturation at max power which cause incredible distortion at high volume. The very high output power eliminate the problem – the speakers blow out before the amplifier starts distorting the sound…
Thanks for this, it’s an education. Although music is important to me I’m not an audiophile, the prices always put me off in my youth. I would have been eating Ramen noodles for months after such a purchase. Taken what was said here as scripture it sounds as if Bose attempted to reach the crowd that was inexperienced possibly from feeling intimidated to enter the audio rooms or even the audiophile store from lack of experience or education, which I think is often taken advantage of there. They may even desire to learn but overwhelmed by choices. Bose approached them, instead of the other way around. Some may only understand sound today because Bose reached them.
I was fortunate to be able to get one of the last production sets of the 901VI’s. I truly enjoy these speakers. I have an old Marantz 2265B receiver from the 70s, and they compliment each other perfectly. One of the best speaker investments I have ever made. Thanks for posting this information about Bose. Cheers!
You mentioned Bose stories. My father started Eastman Sounds Corp DBA/ Martin Speakers USA. He had met Bose many times over the years at sound shows ect . He told me that Omar was an A-hole and a bunch of 4 inch full range speakers (901s) sounded like crap. 😂. My dads speakers would consistently outmatch Bose. My dad only liked one Bose speaker and it was the 601 Series 3. He was still not a fan of cone tweeters. He loved soft dome and strictly used Seas out of Norway. He sold the company is the 80s and Joe they do mostly smoke machines and laser lights.
I’ve always had a mixed opinion of Bose. I remember testing out a pair of 901s in 1980 (Series III, I guess) and they produced all kinds of resonance and distortion as soon as you turned up the bass. The Delco-Bose car systems of the following decade were based on the same 4.25″ driver and Bose conveniently had Delco install bass and treble controls for them that only cut the bass but would not boost it; thanks, but no-thanks! I’ve also run into a few Acoustimass systems that sounded terrible, but there might have been ways to configure them to sound better. Also, I can’t say that I’ve been overwhelmed by the performance of their Wave radios, which sound pleasant but artificial and not worthy of their price tags. On the other hand, I have to admire some of the features Bose has implemented, including the angled-out position of the speakers on the Wave radios, giving them a better stereo image than some of their competitors and the use of similar angling to combine the front and rear surround speakers on some of their home theater systems. The only Bose product I actually own is pair of 201 bookshelf speakers and, in their own boring way, they do their job well for the price (maybe $200) I paid. Interestingly, I thought they sounded better than the bigger 301 models, despite the salesman’s efforts to convince me otherwise. I suspect that that might be because Bose used the same particleboard thickness for both models, making the smaller 201 enclosures better braced against the resonances I noticed from the 301s.
I love Bose. I’m a musician, solo a lot of the time and I’ve been using the L1 compact for solo shows for 7 years. Never skipped a beat, no issues whatsoever and sounds amazing. Also have a bunch of Bluetooth Bose speakers that have an unusual amount of bass punch for such little speakers. Put me in the “fan” column.
The whole idea of intentionally bouncing (and smearing) the sound off of a wall or corner is just silly. In our show room we did everything we could to reduce reflections from surfaces. A high quality recording, in say a cathedral, played thru a high quality system will accurately reveal all of the echo of the original performance.
I disagree with the comments re sound quality. Their new products definitely don’t sound like their old ones but that’s not a bad thing. I’ve been a professional sound engineer for nearly 40 years and when I’m not in the control room I really enjoy listening to the numerous Bose speakers and sound bars I own. the clarity and natural sound is exactly what I want to hear when I just want to enjoy listening. There’s nothing missing and the sound isn’t coloured the way other consumer products are. I’ve purchased competitor’s products both more and less expensive than Bose, only to return them because they didn’t deliver.
I once was in a Bose Store and had an argument with a staff member because all their products wouldn’t decode DTS only Dolby Digital. I told them that this doesn’t help me as I have a lot of movies with DTS audio track, so a Bose 800 Bucks Home System would stay silent. They told me what’s the purpose of it as it only was a 2.1 sound system anyway. I said I understand that, but I would rather have DTS sound played only on 3 websites and missing the 2 rear websites than have no sound, as I don’t had the space for a 5.1 system. They even called the headquarters and gave some technician on the phone who just suggested me that I use my Blu ray player to downcode DTS into a format that they can use like Dolby Digital. I said I wanted the better quality of the DTS, why would I have it for else? I just left and bought a Yamaha who could do it anyway
Around 1976, I bought a pair of Bose 901’s, and a Bose amp. It was ok, but no real wow factor. Later I listened to some JBL box speakers and I was amazed how good they sounded. Much later, I wanted a good sound system for my new TV. I listened to a myriad of small systems and sound bars, but nothing sounded that good. When I listed to the new Bose, it actually hurt my ears. I later learned that if speakers do that, it’s because there’s too much distortion. Then I discovered Axiom Audio from Canada. They have excellent sounding speakers and excellent customer service. I’m totally satisfied with my purchase, but I had to upgrade my subwoofer from them twice until I got one powerful enough for all of my movies. Another upgrade was a rather large center website speaker. But once I discovered what it was I wanted, I doubt I could do better. Pairing them up with a Pioneer Elite receiver was a good match also.
In the early 1990’s I was receiving too many neighborhood complaints about my huge loudspeakers so I sold them and bought an Accoustimass 5 system. The speakers shorted out and back fed and blew up my Yamaha amplifier. I lost a lot of money there and will never go back to Bose. I finally brought my system back out of mothballs with Cerwin Vega loudspeakers. Millennials are blown away by the experience of feeling music.
My first speakers were a pair of Bose 301’s. They sounded good to me when I was about 19 years old and were affordable. I ended up buying a pair of 501’s a couple of years later, which I still have to this day. I think they sound damn good. Anyway, I finally got a pair of 901’s and eagerly set them up in my family room, replacing the 501’s. I played with them for about three days, trying everything I could to make them sound good. I finally gave up and returned them, as they just sounded awful no matter what I did. I guess it’s possible that the equalizer that they came with was defective or something but I ended up buying a pair of Definitive Technology BP 2002 powered towers. They still sound amazing after having them for over 20 years.
In the early 90s I played the “where do I acoustically locate the subwoofer module in this shop” game and never failed. The amount of mids coming from the sub to compensate the very cheaply produced paper wideband satellites was rediculous. The first series 901 actually demanded an insane amount of power to produce sound.
I had a 1976 bose spatial control receiver pretty powerful had a neat way of turning it on you would touch the name bose on the front it had conductive letters the bo and se were seprate they controlled a relay that would turn it on. It was made for the 901s you could use the spatial control to shift the sound to fit the room and had built in 901 EQ.
Bose got me with their cube speaker scam back in the 90s. Same grift…sounded AMAZING in the store, but hooked up to my Hafler power amp, it was nothing unless I had it absolutely cranked. A year later I bought some Paradigm speakers, and they are still shaking the timbers to this day (and so is that Hafler amp!). Bose was a weird company. Technically, those speakers worked…but at volumes that were damaging to the human ear. What kind of product is that?
I had the Bose 601 and they were poor resolving speakers. I upgraded them to factory to consumer Axiom audio M60 and it was true high end for the money. My boss bought the acoustic mas for our company lounge and man they were awesome and delivering 3D sound from movies, but I could hear the tweeter, mid and bass difference as compared to my M60. Yet for movies and its small foot print…Bose was hard to beat. They are good at marketing, and their customer support was top notch. We had an issue with the lounger sub and it was replaced within the week. I also have the sound silencing headset and they really work to block out engine noise while flying. So I agree with Bose in that they research for better products, but I do not agree that its research is focused on true audiophile quality playback.
Interesting. Many years ago (when I was a bit of a muzo) I got an invite to a big audio demo expo & you guessed it, Bose was there. I was blown away buy the direct reflecting tech, even the high end BMW at the time sounded amazing. Anyway, fast forward a few decades & the onset of building a new home, I insisted on finally owning a Bose system. I got suckered into a Lifestyle system but for such an odd shaped room that it went into, it did a pretty good job. Now, a couple of years ago, it just STOPPED !! Bose has never replied to any of my questions via email, face book, no where! I can’t find a repairer to look at it & no, it’s not just a blown fuse. The other amp & out door speakers still work from the Lifestyle centre so I think it’s in the Sub. I would be interested to know what model of Sub Base module has been recalled? I honestly just want my old system going again. it cost me a lot of money back then & it “should work” Thanks for the insight into Bose.
Bose sold because it was DIFFERENT, and they saw the opportunity of a “pro-Sumer” market. People say things like “Bose fooled the customers by boosting this frequency etc.” uh, ALL speakers fool customers, Miles Davis isn’t in that box in your living room. They were never hi-fi, Beats did the same thing and most anyone with any cursory interest in audio knows that, but that doesn’t stop the audiophile community from complaining lol. I’m a Bose pro gear user (various L1’s and S1’s), their innovation has led to many changes in the market, and many knock offs, some better, most worse, but overall, my back thanks them for lightweight, easy to assemble gear 😉 . It also does sound very good for the price, you need to spend a ton to do any better/more powerful. I get complemented regularly, more so than when i ran EV’s on sticks and sub, which weren’t too shabby, but the dispersion and tweeter tuning of the Bose just sounds cool and works great for public address. Bose is Not audiophile, never was, but not without a few advantages.
I had Bose 301 Series 1 bookshelf speakers that I thought were the bomb back then. About a year later I bought a pair of Large Advent speakers which were the best sound-for-the-buck I’d ever heard. I had the Advents for years and years, even had to replace the woofers due to the foam degrading. Loved those Advent’s. Can’t say the same for the 301’s.
Back in the 1960’s and ‘70’s my father and his brother owned a midsized woodworking business located in Cambridge, MA. They were suppliers of speaker enclosures to Bose Corp. most notably the oddly shaped 901 cabinets. I worked there one summer between years of high school and built many 901 cabinets. It was such a simply designed enclosure, with just plywood on the 5 sides, but we did use some very nice walnut veneer over particle board on the top and bottoms. There was nothing fancy about those cabinets. We would build and finish the cabinets, pack them up in the boxes that they would eventually be sold in, then truck them out to the Framingham plant to be completed. My understanding was that the appeal for the Bose was always around it’s direct reflecting design, and that the room becomes as important as the speakers in developing the full sound potential. I never forked out the money for a set, so couldn’t say if they were great sounding or not.
I was living in the UK back in the 70s, when I first heard the Bose 901 at Lasky’s in London, one of the famous hifi stores at that time. Lasky’s was on several floors, if my memory serves me well, i believe it was six or seven floors. The higher the floor the higher end the gear. Guess what floor the Bose 901 were on. If you guessed the ground floor, you would be right. No one in our group, took them seriously, they would only show up at parties, being used as midrange, for loud playing, accompanied by 15″ or18″ bass units, and various tweeter systems. At 21, I was designing tube amplifiers out of my head, I wasn’t the only one in the group doing that type of thing, we were feeding off each others knowledge. In fact, most of us were often working on various equipment designs. At 17, I built my first Peerless 12″ two way speaker kit, and have not looked back since, never buying loudspeakers my entire life, now pushing 70. Just in case you are wondering. Yes I am working on a desktop speaker, also a full range system design. The only thing I can reveal about the latter, is that the bottom end will be servo driven. Bose like everyone else is entitled to their slice of the market. I just never saw them as a valued proposition for me, or any of my group back then and now. Yes! I am an audiophile to the max!
Bose is a good example of what you get when a company with junk products knows how to do marketing. The only thing they’ve ever made that was better than everyone else was their alarm clocks because nobody cared about making nice alarm clocks. 😂 Granted their stuff is smaller than a lot of other options but you can do way better with stuff that’s not that much bigger. I have a pair of realistic minimus 7 speakers with a nice Yamaha receiver and definitive technology 8″ sub that could smoke anything Bose ever made.
I was listening to this on my Bose desktop speakers. I noticed the sound getting lower and hearing the audio becoming more difficult, then it hit me! These speakers are so smart they were censoring the audio… Sill cringe worthy jokes aside, if you asked me about 12 years back what I thought of these speakers, I would have said they’re the real deal! This was mostly due to the fact that my car had an 11 speaker Bose system, and I had just upgraded from an older car that had a no-brand 2 speaker system, and my ears forgot what good speakers sounded like due to not having a home audio system for over a decade. Then I went to an audio showroom in 2013, and I heard Sonus Faber speakers… Bose became instant history. Even my other Edifier R1280Db sound waaaaaay better for 32% cheaper! To make them anything close to decent to listen to, I had to apply an S curve equalization to tame the over-boomified bass and shoot up the muffled highs. U am just baffled by how bad they sound and how I did not notice until a few years later! Now, I use them for my laptop, as they still sound much better than the built-in speakers.
I had a computer shop down in Pinellas County, Florida many years ago. One of my customers did TV and other electronics repairs…He did Bose speakers… 901 and the rest of the lines after that. I was asking around about how many speaker repairs he did.. LOTS. Why? The woofers had failed cone supports after a couple of years… So, per his contract with Bose, he bought a pile of speakers from them and kept them in inventory, then did paid repairs on the speakers. He sold the customer on a “slightly under $100 repair for a woofer with a torn surround… His cost? Let me put it this way, the cost of the speakers was WAY below what I would consider cheap. He made out like a bandit repairing the speakers… and actually had to use significant equipment to work on Plasma TVs and so on back then… (Analog days) I had built a pair of transmission line speakers for my stereo, with imported drivers… that were shall we say 7 or 8 times as expensive just for the actual drivers. Bose knew how to make REAL money on speakers….
Had the Bose 601 speaker pair back in the 80s. They were fine for me until, about a year or sooner, later I noticed very thing I played had this base boom. Ran my function generator to sweep the lower frequencies and they have a bass resonates at about 50Hz. Probably the disadvantage of a ported design, good efficiency but at the price of poor lower frequency accuracy.
Bose success is mostly due to the clever marketing, as the speakers and parts they use are just cheap rubbish and their prices are very high Bose can afford to offer 40% trade inns of already way over priced inferior equipment, through deception and clever marketing. Bose would have their special show rooms rigged, as part of the deceptive marketing. One thing that Is fun with bose 901s speakers is they are fun to blast so loud they burn and blow up. Sound bars are also fun to blow up using a large PA amp, you need to open up the sound bar to drive the speaker directly, don’t bother disconnecting the internal amps just blast them and watch them smoke, cheap gutless plastic rubbish. BOSE- blow, e’m up and then Buy Other Sound Equipment. lol
How difficult can it be to get a message across without having to cut every 5 to 10 seconds, it’s so incredibly annoying to look at that there are no words for it…123,000 subscriptions and a number of years behind you, you would probably think that it could be done without cuts, maybe if the speed was slowed down and the smart ass figure from the impatient commercials was hidden, maybe it would be easier.. Having said that, you have some good articles and topics.