Are you a BOSE hater/basher? why?

[raghupb]

5 pages of this thread is testimony of Bose's marketing reach and education.
A very large number of AV enthusiasts have either owned Bose or at least heard their products at a friend's place or showroom.
I have owned Bose stereo speakers in the past and listened to their HT packages.
Here is what I have to say about them.

Bose stereo speakers were the first set of speakers I ever bought out of my own money back in 1998 while in the US.
Don't remember the model, but they were the starting model and cuboid with MDF construction. This was before they went plastic for affordable speakers.
Bought 2 pairs at $50 a pair and hooked it up to a Sony surround amp.
They were passable for movies, but for music they were just speakers I could afford back then.
Sound was there but no real sound-stage or imaging, but I enjoyed them for 5 years.

HT setups, I have heard both Acoustimass and Lifestyle series.
Back when it was introduced (late 90s), the 5.1 setup was a pocket sized wonder when most companies were clueless about small speakers.
Today, after a long journey into audio/video, offerings from Bose do not excite me at all. The main reason is price to performance ratio.
Too high a price for average performance.
Another thing is that if the bass module fails the system falls apart. Not sure if it is still true, but a friend of mine went through this years ago.
The HT setups don't work well for 2-ch music (for me). Everything seems to fill the room even when 2.1 is in play.
Personally, I like to hear vocal centering, instrument depth, tight and precise bass, etc, etc.

Having said this, I again reiterate, I have nothing against Bose but I am not for them either.
After all, if one likes a particular sound, they will keep liking it until they get bored of it.

Cheers,
Raghu

 

[mandeep]

Th article was published in 2007.
9 years passed, those philosophy doesn't hold anymore.

On the part "changing the whole sound signature", if you can share your audio system details then i can explain it in much better way.

On this ''BOSE on the same path of NOKIA/I can give you many economical reasons, how BOSE will fall eventually'' part, why do i feel some sarcasm here hyeah:

As mentioned in my first post, my system consists of a no. of setups (Yamaha Rx-V663 with JBL SCS 200.5/Bose AM6/Boston XS 5.1 etc ) that i use from time to time as i get Bored with the so called sound signature's. when i get bored of a speaker system i switch to another., May be i need to invest in a very high end audiophile system, but i know myself i will soon get bored of that also and may need to buy some more stuff.

No sarcasm at all, my dear. Please share your views.

''those philosophy doesn't hold anymore'', why?

 

[greenhorn]

The Bose FAQ

I'm surprised nobody has posted this yet !

 

[mandeep]

The Bose FAQ

I'm surprised nobody has posted this yet !

I'm also surprised, similarly nobody posted this also

Bose: No Highs, No Lows, Just $1B in Net Worth - CE Pro

 

[regeHA]

5 pages of this thread is testimony of Bose's marketing reach and education.

+1 and hats off to them.

 

[deba]

There are many speakers available in the market that sounds better than Bose , but when it comes to producing large sound from small speakers there is no one like Bose.......they are master of psycho acoustics........

 

[zimbly]

OT what is your take on the Devialet Phantoms? I'm looking for every possible detail about them these days. TIA.

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

Hey Eddie,

There is a thread started by Sats on the phantoms.... will post my comments there in lieu of highjacking this thread

http://www.hifivision.com/active-speakers/55729-these-will-my-new-speakers-devialet-phantom-2.html

Cheers

 

[unleash_me]

Interesting thread.
FWIW I'm using 2 Bose products; Computer MusicMonitor for office and SoundLink Mini Bluetooth speaker II in the kitchen.
Works perfect, and suits my specific needs.
The latter was actually a replacement to NudeAudio Super-M that failed miserably in comparision to the Soundlink Mini II.
Admittedly, for me these are just convenient lifestyle products. I would never want them to replace my stereo setup.

 

[mandeep]

I wonder, can a pair/pairs of studio monitor's be integrated in a better way for home theatre purpose, then a AVR-Home speaker combo.Goal being better surround sound etc.

 

[saikatbiswas82]

I wonder, can a pair/pairs of studio monitor's be integrated in a better way for home theatre purpose, then a AVR-Home speaker combo.Goal being better surround sound etc.

In broader terms a studio monitor is a speaker with an amp inside the enclosure. If the AVR has pre outs, I think by all possible means they can be used as a home theater speakers.
One more aspect of active speakers - one might not need an AVR at all. Those active speakers can be driven by a surround sound card as well.
If implemented correctly, this sound card and active speaker combo might beat entry level AVR based HT.
Purely IMHO.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

[Audiodoc]

Studio monitors are costlier than entry level AVRS and sometimes top level AVRS too. They are typically for recording purposes where a ruler flat response is desirable. They are also designed for listening at close distances in an acoustically well treated room being mostly placed on either sides of the mixing board. Running long low voltage coaxial from a surround decoder over many meters will be much costlier than speaker wire and is not advisable.

Home theatre is better of with bookshelves for the 4 surrounds a matching centre channel and floorstanders for the fronts and sub woofer for LFE plus 2 more height speakers if you have dolby atmos. Matched speakers are prefered so is a large sub which can go down to 20 Hz for that visceral bass. In such a system you can keep the LFE cutoff at around 70Hz. Frequencies below that are usually non directional.

 

[saikatbiswas82]

Everything is subjective and everything has a price point.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

[Audiodoc]

My point was that every speaker will produce sound but the designers have designed it for a specific purpose. Say I have car speakers, studio monitors, PA system speakers, HTIB, sound bards, bluetooth or wifi speakers etc. All these will produce a decent sound to some extent but a car speaker is usually 2 to 4 ohms and may trip the speaker protection circuit of a typical AVR at high volumes, similarly the PA system speaker can be loud but it's spectrum can be limited. Similarly a studio monitor is designed for recording studios so the recording engineer or music director gets the true unadulterated sound. These speakers though very revealing may feel harsh or dry for usual listening by many people especially for home theater.

Home theatre speakers need a lot of dynamism as sound track can go from 10 dB to a 100 dB in a jiffy. At the same time they should be airy any provide an expansive sound field to generate the typical surround sound atmosphere. Studio monitors are typically lacking in the latter attribute as they usually have a narrow sweet spot as the lister is close by.

https://www.reddit.com/r/audiophile/comments/2pasqs/studio_monitors_vs_home_theater_vs_pa_speakers/

 

[mandeep]

Everything is subjective and everything has a price point

To pursue lightly, the curious case of BOSE's sound Signature/approach/design a little Subjectively, the ''lecture 25'' below By Dr. Amar Bose, provides information about sound imaging, sound perception, specifications, etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gA-oqYPwBbU

It will be real interesting about the conclusions that one can draw from this.

I request all to spare some time and share valuable views and conclusions.

 

[captrajesh]

This thread went on a tangent and there was quite a bit of discussion on DACs which being OT have been branched off into a separate thread. Members can continue the discussion here: A discussion on DACs

 

[siddy]

I've read a million articles online (Bose bashing is quite popular in every Hifi forum around the world). I think it just comes down to what sound you like.

Having agonized over my choices for a compact wireless player this month, and after having gone to electronics stores practically everyday, I finally picked the Bose SoundTouch 20 Series III because I thought it was giving me the best sound for it's size (I didn't have the room for big speakers or an amplifier/receiver).

I've used it for three days now and I love it. The sound is "room filling" as they promised. I found the default bass to be too much, but fortunately their app lets you adjust that).

 

[sam9s]

^^ Exactly for the same price, or maybe couple of thousands more you could have purchased, pretty decent separate bookshelves with a decent amp, that would have easily surpassed Bose soundtouch .... as far as producing sound true to original recording is concerned.

But anyway if you like synthetic sound, may be 30K+ were justified for the joint/compact speaker system SoundTouch 20 is....

 

[nvpatkar]

just a lot of hype in bose !

 

[mandeep]

just a lot of hype in bose !

Bose Hype or no hype, synthetic sound or non synthetic sound , IMHO all that one should care about is whether one like's the sound coming out of the speakers or not. Bose is somewhat overpriced for sure, but the Bose's sound quality at-least to me is simply Great. Recently i purchased Bose 301 and Bose Companion 5 multimedia speaker system also:yahoo:, the sound quality is simply superb or i need my ears to be checked by a doctor (Just Joking).

I'm a big fan of Bose's sound clarity, detail, precision, punchy sound.
Some say they lack mid's and high's but i use a graphic equaliser to control Bose Companion 5 multimedia speaker system's mid's and high's.

PS: I have a good friend of mine who owns a multi brand HiFi shop, i have continuously and frequently heard and auditioned multiple brand systems, to me Bose rates highly among others in my list.