ngp

I wanted to gather opinions from the forum community regarding Bose, the company, products, image, whatever you impressions may be. I'd like to collect some meaningful information for someone that is doing research for this. The more substantiaed your opinion, the better. For example, one may respond that "Bose has way too high of a price". That's great feedback, but what makes you say that? Is there a specific example of something you looked into and found comprable product elsewhere for cheaper and still felt satisfied? Is it based on the general buzz you hear or do you truly have experience for that opinion? Etc. Thanks in advance for your opinions!

Note to Moderators: please let me know if this is appropriate to have here, if not, I'll gladly delete the thread. Thanks.

Sonicflood

Oh great... Another Bose-hate thread disguised as "research"!

Do a google for tons of info (good/bad & why) on Bose.

ngp

On the crontrary, I may be participating in a marketing research study by Bose through a friend and I wanted to get some opinions to relay. I haven't really dealt with Bose products since the original AM5's were released way back when (some time around 1991 or so). I wanted to see what people thought. I know that I still have the impression that Bose tends to be over priced for what you can get from other vendors. But beyond just the products, do people recall marketing by them, thoughts on the any other things about the company? Suggestions for the company such as having more retail presence, etc.

Sonicflood, rather than assuming what my intentions are (which you are wrong in), give me your opinions instead. Good or bad. I've found DVDTalk forums very helpful, especially the Tech forums and thought that this would be great place to start rather than just searching on the net (which I have done and this forum is a part of the Net). Here, I'm able to frame the question and explain why and what I'm looking for. On the net, most of the opinions are about specific products but not enough about Bose the company or its marketing, etc.

Pistol Pete

I had a pair of Bose AM5s for ten years. They were taken when the house was burglerized. Insurance gave me replacement cost which was a bit more than I paid for them. I auditioned a pair of Paradigm Mini-Monitors. They sounded better than the AM5s and were half the cost. I now own a surround set of full-range Paradigm speakers for about the same cost as a set of those tiny Bose cubes.

So I bought Bose and was fairly happy for ten years. Then I bought something else and was even happier. I do know that Paradigm does not have the marketing engine that Bose does. Perhaps they put more $$$ into the speaker components and less into marketing hype. Would I buy a pair of Bose again? Probably not, now that I have been exposed to better speakers not sold at the big box.

The best thing I can say about Bose speakers is that they do hold their value.

Brian Shannon

Bose is a marketing company, first and foremost. What they market is irrelevant.

As far as the products that they market my biggest complaint is that they are afraid of competition. What do I mean by that?

Try to find a store where you can objectively compare Bose products against others. You can't because they do not want their products compared side by side. The regulate their prices and actually make it difficult to compare. Try to find meaningful specs on Bose products and use them to make a purchasing decision. They are more concerned with the image of their "cubes" and what color they come in as opposed to how they actually perform. Is the average consumer aware of the problems trying to connect parts of a Bose system with other pieces? Is the average consumer buying performance or advertising? Even the 901's do not have any meaningful specs as evidenced by the link below.

http://www.bose.com/controller;jsess...ereo/index.jsp

Many people have tried to defend the Bose product on this forum and cannot produce meaningful facts or specifications to compare to other products. They use the marketing buzz words of "bass module" to avoid the outright disclosure of what that actually means.

I haven't even begun to address the issue of price versus performance.

Pistol Pete

I did find the dimensions. I also think it is pretty funny that the only review posted is from The Oregonian circa 1993.

taa455

Have you tried searching the forums over at Home Theater Forums?

I did a quick search in their "speakers" forum and got back a ton of threads:
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...der=descending

Here's an example of one of the threads:
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...highlight=bose

You can also do a search in their "HT Basics" forum and get a bunch more.

Dah-Dee

Brian, Brian, come on, that link does lead to very detailed specs for the 901s:

-----------------------

Speakers: • 12 3/4"H x 21 1/16"W x 12 3/4"D • (32.4 x 53.3 x 32.4 cm) • 35 lbs. (16 kg)

Equalizer: • 2 1/2"H x 13"W x 5"D • (6.4 x 33 x 12.6 cm) • 3 2/5 lbs. (1.5 kg)

-----------------------

See? Regular AND metric measurements!

I particularly like the review tab that shows you "What the professionals are saying" and includes.... *one* quote by the "audio critic" of The Oregonian -- from 1993!


Edit: Uh...... What Pistol Pete said. See, I try to pretty it up for y'all, and jokers come in here with their snappy replies.....

Brian Shannon

Exactly my point

Ask any woman about tiny cube speakers and they immediately know Bose. We refer to this as the SAF or WAF (spousal acceptance factor or wife acceptance factor) and this is what I mean by Bose being a marketing company!

Dah-Dee

Pffft! I *know* that was your point, that was what... I was.... the thing....

kayak99

I contacted Bose once wanting to know the frequency ranges for their speakers since I had learned they are not good for highs and lows. (try it yourself sometime)

Bose responded by telling me they do not give out that information prefering people to use their ears to judge their products.

If that does not tell you something about them, I am not sure much does.

Do you buy a car just because it rides nice and the color is pretty? If you do, you'll love Bose. If you prefer knowing what's under the hood, Bose would not be for you.

Blotto

A guy I work with recently bought one of the bose little cube 5.1 systems. He paid close to $2500 cdn for it, he told me that for that price you couldn't buy better. Then I invited him over to my place to listen to my system (Axiom fronts, center, and rear, cheap KLH sub, panasonic SA-XR25 digital amp.) he was wowed. When I told him that by being patient, waitng for deals, and most importantly doing a little research , I only spent around $1300 he almost cried.

No highs, no lows, it must be bose.

Chrisedge

I love my noise canceling headphones by them

DVD Polizei

Basically what Brian has been saying. And I have a friend who bought a "Lifestyle" system as well for around $2000. We're talking a guy who lives in a trailer with his dad, and he gets a Bose.

He's the stereotypical person who buys Bose products these days:

1) Stupid
2) Uninformed
3) Very easily swayed by marketing
4) Too lazy to do any research
5) It looks cool
6) It's on Shop NBC so it must be excellent quality

Bose was originally a technological revolutionary product, but they had to change their marketing due to products coming out which did the same for much less cost. Only certain stores carry their line, and when they do, notice the products are usually in a room by themselves, with few competitive products in the area.

bboisvert

This is pretty much my opinion right there...

ngp

taa455, thanks for the links, I'll check them out. That's a great site! Thanks for the info.

Thanks gang...the opinions are really what I'm hearing and also have that Bose tends to have overpriced their product and as one of the posts mentions above, they really are hyping through marketing. This is good feedback to get.

taa455

You might want to also check out Home Theater Spot forums. That is also a great site. They have a seperate Bose forum over there.

chess

I bought a Lifestyle 5 system back in the early 90s, when I didn't know an better, and at the time, I thought it sounded great. If memory serves, I think I paid almost $1500 for that damn thing.

I used it until DVD came along and realized that I was stuck with this unit that simply could not be upgraded. Suffice it to say that from there forward, I've been a component guy. I don't buy the top of the line stuff, but I run 7 Energy speakers and a SA-WM40 subwoofer with a Pioneer 711 Receiver and a 5 disk changer with optical digital output. These components do everything that Bose unit could do and noticably more at 2/3 the price. Plus I can upgrade individual components relatively cheaply. Upgrading from 5.1 to 7.1, for instance, cost me about $200 ($100 for the receiver upgrade and $100 for a pair of eXL-15s).

On another note, Miatas (the car) are my other passion, and the most expensive models have come with Bose systems for the past few years. Mine, fortunately, did not. Anyway, just for kicks, search the forums over at http://forum.miata.net for the word "bosectomy" and see how many threads you get. Basically, it sounds good for a couple of years, but the poor construction catches up...especially in a convertible.

All that said, most Bose speakers that I've heard actually sounded pretty good. Not the gimmicky "reflecting" ones, mind you, but the more straighforward 901 types.

X

I don't know about the Miata's, but my car came with a Bose system and I've been completely happy with it. It's lasted 10 years now.

The 901 is a gimmicky reflecting one. 9 drives, 1 in front, 8 in back. I used to be impressed with its sound but I haven't heard one in over 25 years.

chess

As long as it's not exposed to the elements, I would hope a car stereo would last 10 years. In a convertible, all bets are off.

I clearly have the 901 confused with something else. My former father in law had some old Bose speakers that looked pretty straightforward (large paper driver..10 inch maybe...and a ribbon tweeter). I had always assumed that they were 901s, but apparently not. My mistake.

ngp

Great points about the car audio...I forgot all about BOSE car audio. My dad's
Caddy used to have it and it was nice, much better than the standard offering that Caddy had at the time. One thing that I did notice in BOSE car audio is that unlike its home audio counterpart, there was better price competitiveness between BOSE and other brands.

Sdallnct

Well I agree with everyone else, I don't like Bose and do not allow it in my house.

However, there is one thing I like about Bose. It does get people who would not otherwise do it to listen to more music an watch more movies.

I believe in quality, getting good value, doing research, etc. However, a lot of folks just "want to turn it on and it works". And lets face it, anything to get more people to enjoy movies, music, etc, I'm all for.

For example, my friends mom never switched from cassette to CD. She never bought a single CD. However, she heard an ad for that Bose Wave thingy and bought one. Now she buys CD's all the time, got a CD player for the car, etc.

So IMHO, listening to bad sounding music is better then listening to no music. Even a poorly designed home theater system is better then listening to your TV. So if they enjoy it, let them be and more power to them, hopefully it introduced them to movies and music they would not otherwise enjoy. Then, the good Lord willing, it will get them started and they will learn more do more research and replace that Bose later on.

westie7

I don't know why people love to hate Bose. Maybe because it makes you an audiophile if you do. I would not purchase thier prodects due to the price/performance factor and I think thier marketing preys on uneducated comsumser. I don't think Bose equipment is "junk", just not worth the cost.

kayak99

You answered your own question.