The SECRETS that BOSE Won't Tell You! Controversy, Conspiracy, and Cash. BOSE became famous in the 1970's with their Bose 901's, but their history may be more interesting than you think...
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00:00 Intro
00:35 Bait & Switch Story
01:43 History of BOSE
02:10 First BOSE Speaker
03:04 BOSE 901
05:28 The Dilemma
06:25 BOSE Acoustimass AM-5
06:53 How to Fix a BOSE Radio
07:18 The "Great" Trade In Program
07:31 BOSE Controversy
09:06 Is BOSE Good?
09:37 BOSE Recall
10:45 How to Save Money on BOSE
11:10 What BOSE Should I Buy?
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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.
Hahahaha that's hilarious! I've always heard that rumble so I knew it was supposed to be there. It's not surprising that the 901's couldn't get that low since they were just a bunch of cheap 4 1/2" drivers
32 Hz output is outputted on 901s vs hardly any on most. A little windy perhaps on ported models. I used to have horrible feedback about 30 Hz on a couple cheap turntables. I have clear as day spectrum screenshots of 32 Hz response on my test track, ZZ Top, Mississippi 1 minute into song.
@@gregsz1ful do you own a pair of 901's?
@@carewser I do have a pair of 90@ Series V.
@@carewser KZhead will not let me edit or delete and shadow-bans me for last 3 years. I said I have a pair Vs for 4-5 years I got for experimenting. With cabs and EQ. I orginally had a Series II family member has them. I had to fix EQ after having them for 10 years, cap failure no bass, in around 1987, purchased in 1975. Many prefer the early sound better. Over the years I have many speakers and buy a few or modify a few. Build larger systems for DJs, plus horn enclosures. i typically run pink noise spectrum tests to verify performance.
Years ago I was a researcher at a major loudspeaker company, and it was an open secret that Bose had more lawyers than engineers.
There is no such thing as an open secret.
@@mrsmith8436 Shhhh... that's an open secret.
Unless you where in upper management at Bose, you don't know that. Rumors are rarely the whole truth
Sounds about right !, my experience with their product from a electronics repair serviceman & live sound engineer, Bose for me was all way way over hyped , much more style than substance !, and serious deficiencies in performance & reliability of their 802/302 speakers.
Ha ha he had allready developed a very good system and he had to take care of an evil and jealous world.....so he needed lawyers instead of engineers.
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!
Klipsch corner horns... I had a listening experience in a demo room of those speakers. Frankie goes to Hollywood IIRC. THEY WERE LOUD, CLEAR, PUNCHING ME IN THE CHEST. WE COULDN'T HEAR OURSELVES TALK. Carver Amp and pre setup.
That didn't prove anything, i've had faulty speakers from a few manufacturers. It happens
Well that says it all. ..... didnt put the ohm converter /amp in the line. Fries them often...... name that shop so we can avoid.
BTW, who was team electronics ?
There was one in Dubuque. Ia. Bad experience with some JBL I bought there. Never went back
Ok so it wasn’t just me. I always thought Bose was horribly overpriced for the sound and build quality. Their radios aren’t even HD or internet
Still love the good old joke about Paul Klipsch passing Amar Bose in the hallway. Paul cupped his hands and shouted 'hi Amar' and Amar turned his head away from Paul and shouted at the wall 'hi Paul'.
After which Paul concluded that Amar sounded way taller than he looked LOL. Paul was a terrific guy, a true legend.
@@HansOvervoorde After which Amar concluded that Paul sounded a lot thinner than he looked. 🤣 What legends.
You are not kidding about the 901's being iconic in the 70's. Sitting in a friends basement smoking funny things, munching Doritos, and listening to Tubular Bells through Bose 901's made for a great summer afternoon.
"Tubular Bells" very good LP.
The funny things you were smoking no doubt changed your perception of how good the speakers were. How could you hear the music over all that crunching of the Doritos? Seriously, though, it must have been quite an experience. Those 901's were better than anything I had at the time, and Tubular Bells was quite an amazing album to listen to!
Nah, you should have heard Magnepans early speakers!@@theclearsounds3911
I sat in a Hawaiian apartment overlooking the North Shore with some Maui Wowie and my Bose 901's in the mid 70's and now I'm 70 and still the Bose are bouncing off the wall surrounding the Lounge of Loma Vista 😀
My dad got his Doctorate in Acoustics at MIT and while he was teaching there Amar Bose was one of his students. I always got a kick out of his statement that Acoustics was not Bose's major, it was Marketing.
Haha thats fantastic
My Dad was a Sound Engineer, Grad of RPI. He would laugh at Bose.
Bullshit "After graduating from Abington Senior High School in Abington, Pennsylvania, Bose enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, graduating with a BS (Bachelor of Science) in Electrical Engineering in the early 1950s. Bose spent a year at Philips Laboratorium in Eindhoven, Netherlands; and a year as a Fulbright research student in New Delhi, India, where he met his future first wife. He completed his PhD in Electrical Engineering from MIT"
His major was mathematics. He was brilliant.
That is a fantastic story. lol
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.
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.
Bose bluetooth speakers are nice, not accurate but really fun.
There's nothing "optional" about the equalizer that "MUST BE USED WITH BOSE ACTIVE EQUILIZER" printed right on the 901 speakers.
Bose does the best noise cancellation in headphones
"Better sound through litigation" should have been their slogan. IIRC they sued Consumer Reports back in the late 1960s over a reviewers subjective opinion about the stereo imaging of a reproduced symphony orchestra.
@@cafe80s definitely not lol
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.
Means a lot! Thank you! Great info as well, I definitely feel we nailed that part.
@@JustAudioHiFi The JBL Aquarius line was pretty wild. Would definitely like to hear your thoughts on that!
Some older speakers are just awesome. Me and my brother both want my Dad's Polk Audio SDA-1C's. God dam those speakers still sound better then anything I have heard. And they are over 30 years old.
@@mindcrome The SDA series are what put Polk on the audio map. Now they're riding that SQ and popularity wave like Bose is still riding on their successes with the 901s, 501s, 301s, and 101s......
How were you selling on Ebay in the 80s and 90s my man?
The small drivers in the 901 cost $.38 each. My company and Bose had a common vendor.
that much??!!!😂😂😂🎉🎉🎉 i estimated $0.19!!💩💩💩💩🙉🙉🙉🙉🙉
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. 😁
Makes sense. That trick imparted the kind of clarity that was never heard before and produced a Unique Bose sound. Plus not many artists have used very deep base in those days.
I remember those dual-ported ones in the 80's. I guess marketed to the pro-audio market because I only saw DJ's and auditoriums using them. Back in those days there was alot less content below 50hz than today.
@@v12alpine Billy Cobham - Stratus was released in 1973. Leland Sklar on the base. Plenty of it 😁👌👍
Bose also used some trickery with air passages in the cabinets that also created the impression of a solid bass because it increased the sound pressure of lower tones (the famous jet pipes on the front). The drivers you already mentioned were horrible quality portable stereo type broad range speakers that failed often (hifi enthousiasts often accused Bose of just wrapping some copper wire around a piece of carton and call it a driver). Many a Bose owner has had to have multiple drivers in their 901's replaced just because the quality was bad. You didn't even have to drive the 901's hard, because the drivers would spontaneously fail over time. The professional version of the 901's, the 802's, proved that Bose could do it right, as those had higher quality drivers ánd were used in combination with subwoofers that supplied the bass the 901's missed. I've only heard the first version of the Acoustimass when Bose introduced them and those were terrible. Lots of screeching and lots of thumping but an almost absent mid-range and an overall terrible sound quality.
You know those are weird speakers right...they are not in the front..they are in the BACk and the ports turn to the wall....(the actual front is a ported plate with one driver at most)...the CURVED SIDE IS THE FRONT...the wedge shape is intended to go in a corner right...because it sounds as if you guys are describing them turned around backwards to the room...I am not attempting to call you dumb, BUT...I have NEVER seen a 901 with ports on the front (like I said, unless you are mistakenly turning the speakers around backwards because of the way most of the drivers face is REAR).
Bose has always claimed to be a high fidelity brand. However, audiophiles like myself have learned over the years that they are mid fidelity at best. In particular they don't compete with other headphone makers like Sennheiser, Beyerdynamic and HIFIMAN in my humble opinion.
I bought their portable home bluetooth speaker for like 480 bucks (more expensive in my country). Now it only pairs with my iphone. Never again Bose is crap ime
Their self powered speakers are low wattage at high prices
Their noise cancelling tech is very good, probably best patent for consumer use currently
@@jackedkerouac4414 They were crap to begin with - but you're just now finding out.....
Klipsch Heresy's. The End
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.
Pretty much the same as Apple or Tesla. Yet they sell, and the companies skyrocketing. There IS a market there, based on mentally challanged, but deep pocketed customers.
"Unicorn hymens," bruuuhhhh... 🤣🤣🤣
paper cones arent inherently bad. all materials have a specific response. yes, paper is inexpensive, but it has a sound that many people enjoy. i will say that they tend to use very thin paper, so it doesnt last and it cannot take a lot of power.
@@OxBlitzkriegxO exactly. My Cornwalls have a paper 15" woofer.
@@emszabi Not so much Tesla, but with Apple the build quality, components, and manufacturing are actually quite high while Bose isn't. For some reason, these companies gained cultish followings irrespective of quality, features, innovation, etc.; whatever may be the case for that company. They know how to market and brand, I guess, to the group willing to overpay.
I used to work in home electronics sales years ago. We used to have a silly saying "No highs, no lows! Must be Bose" 😂
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 video.
Why not just keep it honest with them 🤦🏾🤷🏾
@@myquietreviewsfeaturingc.t9354 would always reccoment the Denon S301 instead of the Bose 3-2-1. But if customers only wanted Bose (after advice not to) you sell it to them and keep the middle managers satisfied. The Denon system was so much better and the speakers were only a little bit larger same price aswell.
@@myquietreviewsfeaturingc.t9354 Its all subjective. You can think something sounds bad and is overpriced, but that's just an opinion. You can't prove something that's subjective. People buy things all the time that other people hate.
@@myquietreviewsfeaturingc.t9354 I was an Installer, not the sales person, unfortunately that was part of my job.
Nice insight
Ah yes....good memories of the 301's in college, as a bachelor, and through the first 5 years of marriage. When placed right, they sounded awesome for their size. They're long gone, have moved up in the home theater world with speakers, but man, did they ever serve me well when I had them.
I think I have a pair of 301s kicking around that I got somewhere that I don't remember. I used em for a good handful of years before retiring them. I don't think I paid much of anything for em. They also fit the room well looks wise when I was using them. We moved and now not so much so I don't even remember where exactly they are. 😂
@@goosenotmaverick1156 My sister and brother-in-law bought a pair of the floor standing 401's back in 1992. 32 years later, they still use them as their main speakers! IMO, those were exceptional Bose speakers..
I have a pair of 301 series ll, they are on a stand and sit vertically now. Still use them every day 45 years on.
@@Paulman50 that's amazing Paulman!
No Highs? No Lows? It Must Be A Bose!!
Blows 😆
If it blows, it's Bose.
Buy Other Sound Equipment.
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.
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.
Great share!
That is exactly it. I grew up a huge Bose fan. I then learned "the truth" and replaced it all with Polk Audio RTi series bookshelf speakers. I swore off Bose forever, and realized it was all a sham, and they were the evil empire, etc etc etc. Now, I just laugh about all of that. They are what they are, and you're spot-on here. They spent money in exactly the right places, and not one penny more than they had to. They developed a product that fit the needs of consumers like a well-worn glove. There were better products. There were cheaper products. There were cheaper, better products. But there were also a lot of truly satisfied Bose customers. What else do you want?
I was big into home and car audio in the 90's and 2000's. We used to call it "No highs no lows Bose". Their marketing was a lot better than their sound quality or dynamic range.
I thought it was "No highs, no lows, must be Bose".
@billdang3953 Either way, Bose still sounds bad. :) Their newer motto was, "Hey guys, we have little satellite speakers your wife won't bitch about" lol
@@billdang3953 That's the one I remember.
I remember that slogan
Bose - Buy Other Stereo Equipment
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... The Paradigm blow them out of the water in every conceivable way. I still have both pairs of speakers. I've used the Bose for computer speakers for years and the Paradigm served as my main speakers with a sub to anchor them for a number of years until eventually becoming my listening pair in my bedroom.
Thumbs up for paradigm. I own a pair of towers monitor 9s for my humble home 5.2.2 theater. I get lots of compliments on the sound.
I’ve had the Paradigm Monitor 90P’s as my mains for years. Huge speakers, but so impressive in my home theater system.
You're not an audiophile and that trash you were ruining cars with sounded like loud bassy garbage.
I was at BOSE for 12 years, retired now but what stories I have - I still use my BOSE Wave Radio as my alarm clock!
If you wanna e-mail us over some stories send to Sales@Just-Audio.com
@@JustAudioHiFi Jesus you people are desperate.
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.
Have you thought of using a DSP in place of the Bose EQ?
@@ikonix360 No, but I may do so. Thank you for the suggestion.
A quad setup! Have you looked into quad versions online that were made of the classic rock era before it crashed in the mid 70's? KZhead supports quad and other multichannel postings.
@@echodelta9 Never looked into it. Had friends that had quad systems when they were "popular." To my ears the sounds were distracting. Possibly look into it given current workaround technology. Thank you.
@@billfioretti3013 You're welcome. Would allow you to use a powered sub if so desired crossed over about 80Hz which would remove the bass from the 901s which might clean up their sound a bit. Given bass is non-directional, the sub or subs should fit right in and would actually give a more accurate concert type sound.
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.
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 feel your pain, having to get a screwdriver in through the front speaker holes to undo the two screws holding in the crossover aka "Directivity control circuit" to find out what capacitor had rattled off of it!
simple, bose = 💩
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 have a set of 301 Series IIIs that I loved until I got a set of Paradigm Atoms that were 2/3s the money and blew them away. But I think Bose noise cancelling is top notch.
301's were always a great speaker at the price point they sold
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.
Great story!
your granddad was obviously wize man
In 1980, I bought my first decent stereo setup. The shop I was at had a set of Bose 301 bookshelf speakers to use for comparison to what they were selling. I bought a pair of Mission 700s, to go with my NAD receiver. The Missions were excellent, and I still have them!
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.
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.
My wife and I went to one in Las Vegas. During the presentation she looks at me and says, that sounds like crap! I just laughed and we walked out.
I still remember, as a child, my jaw dropping from that cello coming from what was revealed as a tiny cube once the curtain was pulled away. It was a magical experience! Not a Bose fan now, although I do use their S1 for gigs, as it's quite light and has good features for me.
Except almost nobody is going to spend $15k plus to turn their living room into an audio studio, never mind putting up with how it would look and not having windows, maybe even having to add walls and doors they don’t want, now costing you more in the $30k plus range
I used to love Bose when I was selling hifi, why because they made the B&W Solid Sub Sat sound amazing which they were anyway.
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. It sounded 40% better and the DJs were impressed. They asked me why the graphics 25 and 30 HZ faders were pulled right down. I said that the subs cannot reproduce those frequencies so all you're doing is wasting amplifier power. After a few more tweaks with a crowd there I checked the 802s for sound quality. Because these speakers have 8 tweeters per box I raised the upper frequencies just a bit, put the perspex back to stop prying fingers. I said to them that at the end of the night to turn the gain controls on both amps down first to stop spikes from blowing them out and to reverse it when powering up. BOSE speakers are the most ridiculous units ever made. They sound ok for highs but not full range. Cheers Andrew.
Thanks for sharing! Great story and info!
Nice story, good on yah , but how is telling us you're gay relevant.?
I’m 75 year old “Straight Guy” - I don’t give a rat’s patoui that you’re gay 🤠
I think the LBGTQ world would integrate quicker if they quit shining the spotlight on themselves.
@@davej9228 The reason I mentioned it was because of stereotypes. For example many people think that gay guys sit around all day talking about Kylie and Madonna. I love good sound and love improving a system and getting it up and running properly. I don't fit the standard of most engineers which is why I mentioned it. I've been fascinated by electronics since I was 4 years old. I got bitten by the electronics bug and haven't looked back. Cheers from OZ, Andrew
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 $300 pair of brand new Bose QC2 headphones and being on the clock not allowed to take gifts I kindly said thank you and left with the box in hand.
And he was full of crap. The military came up with noise cancelling in 1954. Bose is about marketing.
@@ChefPHD Yup, in the 1950's Dr. Lawrence Fogel invented noise cancelling headphones for aviation Bose just made them commercially available although this story is 20 years old so it's likely he's misremembered some of the details
I actually own the Bose QC 2 earbuds : I didn't pay 300$ for them but I can say they have really good noise cancelling but a lousy microphone and tons of firmware bugs making them not suitable for daily phone calls. that last point alone, makes them good for flights only . barely worth half their Price.
Bose first products were power supplies for aircraft.
The headphones were one of their good products. But Sony do them better now.
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.
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.
Plus ir makes for lighter cones that move easier.
Haha... I actually do enjoy the mid/late-90s AMs. I wouldn't have ever claimed they have great imaging, though. It was definitely more about "big" sound, than being able to place sounds accurately in a panorama. Maybe I've never had them "carefully set up" though. :-) As for paper cones, yes -- my Yamaha Club V PA tops have been absolute workhorses for y-e-a-r-s. Paper woofers. I'm actually building my own DIY speakers that are designed to look exactly like miniature Club Vs, shrunk down to 4" woofers. I selected Dayton Audio DS-115 4" paper cone drivers for those.
PA speakers are nothing like (or should be like) home audio loudspeakers!
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.
That's wy the 901s had a special equalizer and ports in the back to help generate the lows.
Bose always had a separate "bose only" listening room because they would loose the battle in a A/B listening to any half decent brand.
LOL. Polk Audio? You think that's HiFi? 🤣🤣😆 Polk Audio is basically the Great Value brand of speakers. Try Bowers & Wilkins, Focal, or Definitive Tech instead.
@@SergeantExtreme Yes. Polk Audio. I've listened to B&W and Focal. Nice speakers. Your ignorance of Polk systems from the 1980's is hilarious.
@@SergeantExtreme In the end it's all about buying what you like and not what someone else thinks that sounds great. All those "HiFi" brands claim to be the one closest to "true sound" but they all sound different. It's like your favorite color, it's a matter of taste but some swear that the same color of paint from another overpriced brand is much better especially after watching it dry for a while.
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 channel as stated on the bass unit. It wasn't until I upgraded my amplifier to a unit at 100w per channel 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.
After WWII, my dad got a job working at a Singer Sewing Machine dealer. They went out and sold the convenience of new ELECTRIC sewing machines to people (by the thousands) using the old foot treadle operated machines. They offered a ridiculously high trade in value for the old treadle machines and almost no one refused the deal. He told me that when the old treadle machines were brought back to the store, the odd one that was still in "showroom" condition would be put on the floor to sell as a used machine. All the rest... were treated to sledge hammers and sold to scrap iron dealers. It worked because the prices on the new electric machines were inflated to the point that they still made a fortune on each machine after trade-in. You can bet the margins on those new BOSE speakers are high enough that even with the trade-in, BOSE is making a healthy profit. Personally, I don't see all the "wow" factor with BOSE. The table radios sound great compared to most modern table radios. But if you compare them with old German table radios from the 50's and 60's (like Blaupunkt or Nordmende).... the BOSE radios only sound so good because everything else sounds like garbage today.
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.
Thanks for sharing!
Yamaha is a solid brand for a lot of the stuff they make. Never much cared for Bose. Had too much good equipment growing up (my dad is an audio nerd) to hear the difference in a few moments (flat highs, flat lows - decent mids in MOST cases; their car stuff has been solid from the cars I've heard them in - though not the best, but not bad). Too expensive for me that sounded no where near how expensive they were/are (IMO). Not saying it was junk, but not for me.
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 love my Acoustimass speakers! I have 2 sets which I use solely as surround rear speakers. Nothing better at this size...
I still have my Bose Series II speakers that I bought in 1976. I don't use the Bose equalizer, I use the one in my receiver which has auto set-up. I also have the rear of the speakers facing forward. Works great. 👍👍
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
Not a bose fan , never been .
Which Bose system was it?
Yeah, had a pair of Series 2 that I picked up when stationed in Germany. 220 volt equalizer. When I turned up the volume quickly I got that same distortion. Never felt the same way again about the system.😢😢😢. Eventually just dumped the system unfortunately.
That's great! I'd have fed a guitar or drum recording into it and reamp'ed it with a solid stereo mic pair, except that portable DAT technology came along about a quarter century too late for that.
Go buy some "TUBE GEAR" and enjoy your Shure and 33 & aThird
I owned a pair of 901s series 3 that I had refurbished about 6 years ago. They sound pretty awesome. Maybe they are not as accurate as my jbl 4312s but the sound is pretty incredible. I can't speak for the modern Bose speakers.
Same here👍👍 ,here we go again...... Bose bashers 😒😒
@@Arch007 I think most who bash haven't really heard them. I have friends come over and all they want me to do is plug in the 901s, put a ACDC CD in the player and crank it up. Keep up the great videos!
@@dlangston2020 Most of my music is classic and jazz and they sound excellent.
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.
HA!
I can remember selling the Bose 901s in the late 70’s. A pair were set up about 12” away from the wall in the speaker demo room. I would put on ‘Jeff Beck and the Jan Hammer group live’ album and crank the volume up a bit. The initial audio was a synthesizer that started mid frequency, ramped up, and then down really low to right at the natural resonance of the 8 rear firing speakers. This resulted in a fair amount of air being pumped out of the cylindrical ports on the back. It was at that point that I would release my hold on a sheet of paper near the wall behind the speaker. The airflow held the paper against the wall until that low note faded away and the paper would then fall to the floor..... 😳🤔😊 SOLD !!! 😂 PS.... it was the first cut on the second side of that album. Also..... Bose put a lightbulb in series with the voice coils inside of the speaker cabinet to ‘increase’ the power handling limits. As more power went through the voice coils, the light bulb filament would get hot and glow increasing it’s resistance and thereby limit the actual power going through the speakers !!!
Nice story!!
@@JustAudioHiFi There was a separate speaker demo room that had a Nacamichi cassette deck, a 3BX compression expansion unit, and a Crown DC 300A power amp driving select-ably either a pair of Klipsh Cornwall, or a pair of Infinity Quantum Line Source speakers. I recall the first time walking into that room and a selection I wasn’t familiar with was playing through the Infinity pair. Sounded REALLY nice ! As I was listening, someone said something from behind me and I turned and NOBODY WAS THERE !!! 😳 It was someone in the selection that was playing. 😊
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.
People HIGHLY underestimate the power and beauty of a good home theater system. I've had a denon 7.1 system from around 2015 I believe and it was great, I gifted to my uncle. Currently I use a Harmon kardon AVR 135, jbl bookshelf speakers, infinity center channel and jbl/Polk subwoofers, all driven off my fiio m11+. It sounds amazing, best setup for a small room, the soundstaging and emersion is incredible, every person I have ever showed my system is immediately blown away. You don't have to spend thousands to get the audiophile experience, it's just about matching the right gear to the right environment (:
@@POPDELUSION " it's just about matching the right gear to the right environment " I would definitely agree with you on that in general, but if you want the "audiophile" experience, you'll be better served by dedicated 2 channel equipment. I have some of the best home theater components money can buy and they pale in comparison to good 2 channel gear set up properly, and don't cost anywhere near as much. Maybe if recordings were originally engineered for multi channel systems, it may be something worth looking into, but they're far and few between.
When I was a kid in the early 2000s, you were a baller if your parents had Bose speakers. I remember going in houses with 401's and Acoustimass Red Lines. Every restaurant had 151's and 32SE's outside. Good times.
I was a kid in the early 2000s and all I remembered was how tinny the Tahoe's Bose sound system sounded and how underpowering the wave radio was compared to my family's Klipsch home theater setup. Granted, we're comparing apples and oranges, however, I just remembered not being all that impressed with Bose products, especially when the wave radio was advertised as having sound as huge a large stereo (it doesn't.) I do love their headphones though.
Bose did more damage to sound quality than any other manufacturer. You were not critical enough of the company.
When the Bose 901 came out at $900 a pair, my neighbor and some enterprising engineers reverse engineered the speakers and crossover network. I remember they built over 10 pair in his garage and the wood materials were the most expensive part. Speakers as I recall were $1.75 each.
👏👏👏👏👏, if that...$0.19 more likely...
I got my BSEE in 1990. One of my professors had been a contemporary of Amar Bose at M.I.T. I don't know what transpired between those guys back in the day, but he had a couple of lesson plans based around demonstrating scientifically how Bose was "Better Sound Through Marketing"
I love their (older) QuietComfort 25 headphones. It's one of the most comfortable headphones you can buy and they sound surprisingly good too. I never checked out their follow-ups like the QC35 or QC45.
It's the only Bose product I ever owned, and they were awesome at the time when they came out (not many good nc headphones back then). I still use them to this day because as you said, they are super comfortable and sound okay.
I still have AM5 setup I bought from Costco in 1990. Works fine. QC2 ANC headphones was a game-changer for air travel, but terribly cheap materials. QC3 sounded even better, but the same junky build. When my QC2 broke beyond repair I replaced with QC30 wireless. They didn't sound as good nor cancel as much noise as the QC2, then the power switch broke one week past warranty and would not turn off (or disconnect) making them drain quick and useless. Bose offered 40% discount on replacement, which I applied to the neck-wrap "earbud" version of the ANC headphones (QC35?). Terrible HISS when in ANC. Exchanged them, same HISS, and they started falling apart within a year. A colleague bought the wired version (two of them) they hiss too, so it wasn't the Bluetooth. After that I was done with Bose.
Audiofools believe the stoopidest of things.
I got the QC35 II, and they are honestly.. not so geat. my Apple AirPods Pro deliver better sound quality and better noise cancelation... and the AirPods Pro don't come with ear pads that die within one year of usage. The AirPods also don't "crash" and require you do plug them into USB power to reset them.
I just got back from a trans-atlantic trip. The neck-wrap "quiet control" BT NC earbuds are now officially dead too. You can't press the switch hard enough to turn them off/on. There is no tactile "click" anymore. I'm officially 100% done with Bose, no trad-ins anymore. Fortunately, I brought my Galaxy Buds Pro as a backup (but they never sounded that good and the ANC is marginal). Time to shop around.
I think Bose got his doctorate in marketing, not electronics...
I still have my 301's from 1980. I did have to replace the foam, but they still sound good to me. Great video about Bose.
I bought a number of Bose speakers cheap, at rummage sales in recent years, for my cabin…I was amazed at how good they sound. At home…it’s Klipsch only, but in the log cabin, they rock.
I kind of feel the same way. Bose isn't nearly as good as many people pretend they are. But they also aren't nearly as bad as many people claim, either.
I kind of feel the same way, if only I could afford a rock, in this high real estate market.
@@BaltimoreAndOhioRR So they're.... really average? Below average? Saying two things that negate each other doesn't amount to 'a point'. But to be clear, Bose as a brand is inconsistent at best and seriously trash at worst. Sure they HAVE made SOME good things, and so has Behringer and a lot of other inconsistent brands that don't deserve to be lauded either. They're selling a mystique and a status symbol, not 'good sound'.
@@jamescarter3196 My point is, Bose is in an odd position. There are people who love them and will buy anything and everything they sell and think they are the best. Then there are idiots who go around making snarky comments to everyone mentioning Bose. (I hope those people know who they are). Bose are not "that" bad. Yes, they're definitely overpriced. But too many people act like they're the worst speaker ever built. Some people, actually many people, like their sound. I equate it with photography. Some photography purists can only appreciate a photo that is as close to natural (and authentic) as possible, while many people think a picture that came from a camera that oversaturates a blue sky for example, actually LOOKS better, regardless of it's accuracy. Their sound is not accurite and they dont reproduce the input exactly. But what they do produce sounds good to many people. Also, some people think of Bose as 901's, others 601's, and some others the 321 surround systems. So you get varying emotions. The bottom line is, as I was trying to say, is that Bose is NOT just an average speaker. They sound above average to many people, but quite below average to many other people. Some people like the accentuated mid-bass and the lack of "directioning" - scattered sound everywhere. Some people hate that and want an exactly accurite sound reproduction of the input media. And those people seem to be on a mission to tell the other people they are wrong. That was my point. (PS, when I talk about Bose, I generally refer to their older bookshelf and floor speakers, not the newer ventures they've branched into like surround sound, clock radios, headphones, car audio, docking stations, etc...)
I am not a Bose fan, except for their QC headphones, but my university pub's sound system back in the early 80s had 12 Bose 901s and was powered by some massive Carver amps. I have to this day never listened to sound this loud with such clarity.
I also attended a live concert in a room that had dozens of 901s in a mid sized room. It was truly amazing. I know audiophiles make fun of Bose, but when properly set up they were formidable.
I have a set of 301s that I ran the line through a passive/active crossovers and into a set of 10" subs in a open multipass bandpass box to handle everything under 120Hz with a gradual taper up to 200Hz. When setup in my room with a Yamaha RX770 it sounded amazing.
Love them too, except the ear cushions, they only last like 6 months, 12 if you're lucky
@@_BangDroid_ Mine lasted about 5 years, but I pretty much only use them for air travel. I replaced them a couple of years ago - good as new.
@@user-fu8vn7xo6c I'm not sure how those 901's were configured, but it's now a common thing to stack speakers in what's called a "line array", and you can get surprisingly good sound out of not-so-good speakers that way.
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 moved to Sacramento in 86. Started going to Faces Disco. The club used Bose 802's. Two3 302 bass speakers, Bose and the four 802's suspended about 8' high. Sounded pretty good but never loud or strong enough. They remodeled several years later. I did the sound install. I ran 14 gauge wires through the ceiling to the four corners of the dance floor. Providing the sound after playing with amp levels etc. comes out pretty flat, then you did a good job. Now the "dance floor disco EQ curve is a boost at 100hz, a small boost at 250hz, a small cut at 1k,, then boost 2k, 4k, & 8k to bring the cymbal energy alive and the 100 hz boosts the kick drum while cutting the 1k stops the singer from "screaming in your ear. The sound was not fatiguing and the eq made the music alive but not shrill at that volume for 5 hours a night. They had a sound engineer from a rock club come and eq the system. Brought up the mid bass and vocals, made it really muddy and exposed this system's weaknesses and they sounded like shit. They ended up buying the system from a club that was closing. This system was TOO BIG for that club. Even playing at "normal" disco levels, the sound was so much stronger, you can now hear the dance music in the video room stepping all over their videos & music. Oops.
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 recently found your channel and I have to tell you that I'm not into audio as much as I was in my youth but the level of research and knowledge that you impart with your storytelling is absolutely phenomenal and I've been watching all your old shows just to catch up! Cheers
Wow sorry about the real old ones haha. But there is some great stuff! You are going to surely enjoy what is coming next week...
Does he have any videos about quad receivers? She said her stereo was 4 way......... And I just love it in her room........ -the one and only Frank Zappa
I remember the first time I heard Bose, I was working for a sound and light company who refitted nightclubs and I was sitting in their office with this tremendous sound. I looked around the room but all I could see were these two little stacks of cubes, I couldn't believe this sound was coming out of them, oh and the hidden sub. We used to fit the professional Bose 901 it was one of the most popular choices besides JBL.
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 '..
How funny (as a first-generation AM5 owner) ! I love it 👍
OK, to be fair... I bought a set of Acoustimass 7 speakers when I was much younger. I wasn't yet old enough to move out on my own, so I was living at my parent's home, and had only my own bedroom. Big speakers weren't an option. But I loved audio, and was obsessed with home theater, and surround sound, etc. I had an absolute ton of fun with those AM7s. So much, that recently I decided to build a shed out back, with a retro theme -- CRT projection TV, LaserDisc player, old computers and video game consoles ... that sort of thing. I'm going to put that Redline generation of Acoustimass speakers out there. Are they the best sounding speakers I could use? Not by a long shot! But they're pretty, they're fun, and they'll fit in well with 480i resolution video sources and Sound Blaster audio. :-) Horses for courses. Nothing "sad" about it, except when people think they're getting something they aren't. If your expectations are aligned with reality, and the price is acceptable to you (whether that's because you can afford the mark-up, or you're getting something secondhand), then nobody's getting hurt.
Exactly what I wanted to say @socalav! Thanks for saving me a few minutes of typing! 😄 Many years ago, I talked to a Hi-Fi store (remember them?) sales guy who said that to be allowed to sell Bose gear, they had to set up a separate Bose demo area and they were not allowed to do A/B demos. Breach of these conditions could've had them cut off by Bose. Because some people were looking for these, they went along with it for a bit of extra cashflow which all businesses can do with. I think Bose gear is a fashion statement first and audio product a (distant) second. I've never liked the whole Bose image with underwhelming product specs, overpricing and legal strongarm tactics.
@@sandman0123 Yes I had been told about the threats Bose had made. Our company really started emphasizing our anti product disparagement policy, salespeople were prevented from saying negative things about products, but it was mostly Bose that sent in secret shoppers. I was free to show something better but I couldn't say something was drek.
" I remember when Bose created separated demo display areas in stores away from the retailers soundrooms..." Hi-fi manufacturers ALL disdain the idea of competitors speakers in the demo environment, they act as passive resonators and color the sound of the speaker you're listening to.
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."
Later to become only highs and lows...
I bought a pair of Celestion speakers from a man whose wife insisted he get rid of them and have Bose instead because they took up less space. He was holding back the tears as he told me. The things we do for love.
Still rocking my 901's in wood cabinet from the 90's in my Den, Bose 301 satellites and base module in my bedroom and Bose Smart 500 in my Living Room. Great company.
Bose is the apple of the sound industry.
All of my Bose speakers from the 80s still sound great. My main Left / Right are like a angled triangle, 301s for high rear and am5 for rear.
I enjoy those 301s!
Did Mr. Bose change the world of audio? Yes. Was the 901 an absolute masterpiece? Yes. Did they beat a set of monster floor speakers with 12+" woofers? Nope.
My thoughts exactly
no highs, no lows? must be bose!
@@RVecc Buy Other Stereo Equipment
Still have my 1980s JBLS. When I die maybe I'll have my ashes buried in them. 😁
@@RVeccit's why it came with that eq.
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 video out there. Well done.
Back in the 90’s I purchased a pair of Thiel CS 2 2 s. Bose threatened to sue Thiel if they used a decimal point if they called them Thiel cs 2.2s. Trust me no one would mistake the Thiels for the Bose!!
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.
Oh wow great conspiracy there!
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.
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.
44 years old, never spent a cent on a Bose product. Was intrigued at times, for sure. But I just never saw the match between what I was looking at right in front of me, and the amount of money they wanted for it.
I have Bose 301 book shelves a friend gave me. Hey, can you shed some light on the class of amplification in the great old receivers, amps, inter.-amps? Also satellite speakers and subwoofers combo’s. What ever happened to Carver equipment? Thanks
I knew a guy back in the 80s who had the 901 speakers, but he had them set up backwards with the 8 drivers facing forward and the one driver facing away. He insisted they sounded better that way. At the time I thought so too.
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.
The Bose noise cancelling headphones are top quality. The silence you can get from them is eerie.
Talk about the Bose 1801 power amp 250 W per channel they made for the 901s Used to go to a club that had the 901s and that power amp great sound
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.
May I ask, did you have the dedicated EQ? There was period of time in the 70s that the Army PX stores were selling the speakers to serviceman WITHOUT the EQ, and many people later bought them 2nd hand the same way. Hooked up with enough power the 901s with the EQ sounded pretty damn good. As for the other comment made about the 901 drivers being in a catalog, the ones I am familiar with and trained on, at least series IV onward, were DEFINITELY NOT catalog bought. They were absolutely made by Bose, with the voice coil wire and the cylinder formers both made from aluminum, to prevent warping under high heat (both the formers and wire had the same coefficients of expansion and hence retained their shape) and the wire was flat edge wound as well for better heat dissipation.
@@socalav An EQ will make almost any speaker sound better.
@@socalav The EQ was necessary to compensate for the poor frequency response. Every Bose speaker I have heard sucks. The same for their headphones. Great sound cancelling but poor sound quality. I use the Bose while mowing the lawn to quiet the sound of the mower but for far better sound quality I use my Audio Technica M50X headphones.
@@nyobunknown6983 LOL Im partial to the Sony MDRV6, AKF240s Denon SHD950 and a bunch of others.. not sure what Bose speakers you have heard and where, but they did make some really decent ones for a while. My personal favs are the Bose 301 series II and III. They still sound good compared to a lot of others on the market today. For a low price entry level bookshelf they did really well.
That would be DR BOSE to you ? right..... further more and additionally his net worth is WAY more than yours I'd venture to speculate...HEH!! heh heh heh:) Now aren't you the "Better" man....
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 channel 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.
circuit city used to let customers trade in speakers for new ones. I did it as a kid back in the 90's. I still have the last pair I got from a trade in, sitting on either side of my desk, right now. they're mostly still here just to lift other speakers up near the ceiling, but they still work and sound fine.
Only Bose I ever had were amplified bookshelf speakers that I had hooked up to my Mac. Remembered they had surprisingly good sound for such a small speaker and more bass than you would expect.
Don’t tell me… could those mighty little speakers have been Bose “Companion” speakers? There are (or WERE) about 50 sets of those at CBS “Television City In Hollywood”, in a big room near the Edit Bays. Each pair was connected to a different (broadcast-type) video recorder, fed with TV City’s signal routing system. This enabled them to record, and later use, edited versions of non-CBS News stories. Those are the ones they use on CBS Affiliate Stations (as well as at the stations they own) on which you see the words “Courtesy (a non-CBS News source)” in the upper left corner, at the beginning of this “borrowed” video on your local TV newscast. I have two sets of “Companions” on two of my Mac laptops. They sound just fine, and were relatively cheap when they were new. I got both sets a couple of decades ago, and they work great for mp3 and mp4 audio. I’ve never heard REAL audio through them, so I can’t say a thing about how these things REALLY sound.
@@edryba4867 This was in the late 80’s, early 90’s. They were the 101 Music Monitor speakers. I think I’m familiar with the ones you’re talking about. They were on some computers at a law firm where I worked. They had very good sound as well.
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 videos.
Thanks! You should come by!
You forgot to talk about Bose suing Physician's Monthly and Audio magazines in the late 1960s. Sued them for critical reviews of the 901 speakers. For many years Bose spent far more on marketing than research and development.
although i have repaired many bose systems both domestic and commercial one sticks out ahead of the rest. a cluster of 8 bose 802's hung from the rafters about 15 yards up. each 802 had 8 cones onboard but it took only one to fail and the whole box shut down. the fun bit was these speakers were in an ice rink right above center ice. now putting a "cherry picker" on an ice floor is interesting as the pressure of the outriggers actually melts the ice slightly so when swinging the boom arm clockwise the base moves counter clockwise. thankfully these speakers have now been replaced.
Nice story!
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).
Lol your crazy man, props for thinking outside the box. I also really like the old bose subwoofers. I own a few and they always surprise me with big sound from small package. In my area the old bose subs resell for 30 40 dollars I feel like they are worth more, so i never sold any of mine :) i have 4 total
This was actually the demise of my old Acoustimass system. The bass module did not last long in the hatchback of my old car, connected to a Sony 200W amp treating it like an actual subwoofer. ;-) After a couple weeks, it started making some unhappy noises, and then it stopped making noises at all.
I really like this history behind Bose. Could you do the same thing with Klipsch, JBL, etc?
We have some big Klipsch plans, maybe even some JBL
I had a pair of series 4 901's that I bought new in '79. I absolutely loved those speakers, and so did everyone that heard them! Oh, and I still have the Marantz 4240, and Dual CS 721 turn table that I used with those speakers. I used those speakers for 10 years, and sold them for what I payed for them brand new!
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!"
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.
Yeah very much agreed! Thanks for sharing
They cover more like 30% of the audio spectrum. Psychoacoustic razzle dazzle.
Bose was the first Apple lol
@@mikel9656 Sony was the first Apple.
@@user-cd8ri1mc6s No, that doesn't make any sense when we're talking about companies that create gimmicky products of inconsistent quality that crap out after 4-5 years and rely on a false mystique to overcharge everybody for everything. Sony's products are a LITTLE more expensive, because they actually make high-quality stuff. Naming random tech firms based on 'bigness' isn't the point.
My dad has a bose soundbar and sub in our small room and it sounds really good. the sub is probably around 6" and it can really hit lows really well.
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.)
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.
or get a full range speaker and lose the sub
Absolutely.
@@BostonMike68 It depends on the budget. I can only afford loudspeakers that could go down to 50 hz. A subwoofer can provide a cheaper option to take care of the low frequencies to 20 hz. Of course if I have the disposable resources, I would go straight to full range ones.😉
@@BostonMike68 That's a myth. You can use subs with small speakers, but you get the best results when subs are used with full range speakers. Otherwise you are asking the sub to try and handle the frequencies the full range speaker are supposed to handle. Or you just have a hole in between the small speakers and the sub.
@@pinkypoohable that's true it's hard to find speakers that play that low. I built my own with 10" woofers that hit really low and a MTM with 6.5 mids and that doesn't start rolling off until 40 Hz but not to many people can build quality speakers so I am lucky but I agree it's just the timing the larger subwoofer moves slower . I'm actually building a diy sub mostly for movies and it has 2 voice coils so it moves faster but its going to cost me almost a $800 just to build it myself but it's going to be really hard to beat and I want it to get down to 22 Hz
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.
Find a sound dock 10, it was an iphone dock that had similar transducers to that project. Closest thing to a home audio product around it.
Back in the 70s, there was a small music store west of Boston that kept a copy of a Court Injunction that kept them from comparing Bose speakers with Klipschorns on the coffee table in their listening room. I had to go to another shop to hear the Bose, but my ears heard the difference and I went back and bought a used pair of K-horns that came off traded in mono systems. Sadly, I don't have corners for K-horns right now, so they are in the basement. I fire them up when I work in my shop. I thought the Injunction was Bose marketing at its best.
The saying back in the '80s and up was, if it has no highs & has no lows, IT MUST BE BOSE...😂😂
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!