About 6 months after I bought the QC25's, the cord went bad. I called Bose, all armed with my receipt and attitude, ready to go battle to get them to honor the warranty and replace it. The rep on the other end apologized profusely, asked for my name and address and assured me a replacement would arrive within the week. "Don't you need proof of purchase, like a copy of my receipt or anything?" I asked. He laughed and said, "The 25's haven't been out that long. They're all currently under warranty. No proof needed. Have a great day." The replacement cord arrived in 2 days. Best customer service I've ever received, bar none.
I had the same experience when the Bose earphones I bought my dad stopped working. This actually happened twice and both times Bose replaced them without question.
All of those guys - internally called the Customer Focused Development Team - were let go and replaced with a call center in India, all at once. I remember the day it happened. We were all in shock. Those guys were GENUINELY there to make sure customers were taken care of, and they were a great bunch of people to boot. Bose dropped them all like a bad habit. The experience you had was with CFDT, given the timeframe of QC25…
I worked for Bose on the retail side from 03-07. The Wave Music System series 1 was released in 05. We had a display of the Wave taken apart on a spine showing each layer of its components. It looked like Jonny 5's head from Short Circuit. It was pretty cool. It was half an octave lower and has two individual 26-inch tapered waveguides, one for each speaker. It was a big improvement over the original. The original had two drives as well, but only one actually utilized the waveguide. It was a great company to work for because the company really appreciated you. You were not just an employee. Unfortunately, Dr. Bose passed away in 2013. He was the reason why I have a passion for audio engineering. RIP
@RenaissanceEarCandy The retail side is long gone because Bose closed all of their stores. However, I do think it's still a great company to work for. There are different divisions within the company that are great.
@@jwmcq ah thanks for the memory jolt! I’d totally forgotten about that. Wonder where that -tat- equipment ended up prob a combo of eBay, Etsy Ali express etc!
The "Got no highs, got no lows, must be Bose" saying goes back to the Bose 901 Direct/Reflecting speaker system in the '70s. The issue with the 901 is that it is VERY sensitive to where it is placed in the room. Set it on a bookshelf? Sounds like crap, hence the saying. However, if you followed the directions exactly (as in, very low Spousal Approval Factor), they sounded phenomenal. Back in the early '90s, my mom bought a Bose Wave Radio. It was put on a corner shelf up near the ceiling in the kitchen. It had excellent sound, especially given its size. (The corner placement didn't hurt one bit...) Of course, an audio patch cord was run down behind the curtain so my brother could hook up his cassette player. A few years later, when the Wave Radio/CD was released, my mom bought one of those for the living room. She still has both, and they get daily use.
I worked with a guy that loved Bose - he had a set of the Bose 901 floor-standing speakers in his house. This was back when they developed the idea of 'whole-room stereo." He noticed that one of the 8 front drivers was blown on one side and called them up. They sent him a replacement in less than a week - the ENTIRE left 901 speaker assembly. They told him to keep the old one - not to worry about returning it unless he just needed to get rid of it. They had his info on the system and knew that he was a loyal customer , Bose didn't flinch over sending him that replacement. I thought it was pretty commendable!
@@Sashko_Dee When you use cheap paper drivers including paper cone tweeters, MDF boxes, and cheap crossovers, your margins are so high that you can afford to send out replacement parts and, apparently, entire speakers. It makes your customer service seem legendary. It's the opposite of a loss leader.
They use the Cheapest Chinese junk drivers, ever produced. In addition to them massively overcharging for this Junk... Its why they dont care at all, about sending some Cheap replacements. I have a pair of EPI 100v speakers, made in the 70s. I also found a pair of foam rotted Bose speakers, in the thrift shop, for dirt cheap. My single EPI woofer, probably weights more than three of the Bose woofers. Why? Because EPI uses high quality woofers... capable of FAR more power, and far more Cone Control accuracy. They have Massive Magnets, for much faster acceleration + superior cone control.. which results in far less potentials for Micro-Distortions (which happens with cheap, low power, ECO-Speakers). They also have floor shaking Bass.. where as B0se woofers can only produce artificial sounding bass... with no actual physical "THUMP" at all.
I think the little story you told towards the end of your video, about your wife being so inspired by the sound that she went back to listen to her music library, sums it up. She was hearing things on this device that renewed her interest in listening. That can't be a bad thing, and, is how the product should be judged. A rather subjective issue at least, but, at best well demonstrated in the video. Bravo!!
I had the exact same experience with the Bluetooth function on my Vizio soundbar. I was hearing things I had literally never heard before, different instruments, different ambience, it was a whole new experience... I would highly recommend their "2.1" AiO soundbar. (2.1 in quotations because it has 2 subwoofers in the soundbar itself, making it a 2.2)
I am an older fella but I have been a Bose fan since they became available here in the northern Arkansas / southern Missouri area. We never had a store here in this hilly billy area but Best Buy carried many of their products and displays. I have purchased a couple sets of the QC 25 overear headphones and I was never happier. I can still buy the ear pad replacements on Amazon for a really reasonable price and I have replaced them several times. There is no way I could ever buy another pair as times are a lot rougher than they were back then so I am grateful the ones I have are still doing great 20 years later. I appreciate this creator’s content and look forward to it each week. I wish the very best of health and happiness to you all and to your families!
Hiya fellow Arkansan. 👋 My mom has had a Bose cd wave radio since the late 90's and it's still going strong. Such rich, warm sound that's got great bass as well. Hope everything is going well up there in the Ozarks from down here in the delta region.
@@christopherangeli1141 Thank You for those kind words! That really brightened this morning up for me! It has been over forty years since I was last in your fair city and it was amazing. I wish you all the very best!
Funny enough, Wesley's original comment and Techmoan's video reminded me of the Bose store the used to exist in Osage Beach, MO in the early 2000s. It was at what is now the Osage Beach Outlet Marketplace. I remember going there in the summer of 2000 with my 1st wife, my cousin and his wife. I think there also may have been a Bose store at the Tanger Outlets Branson back in the 2000s, although I'm not entirely sure. I used to frequently visit the Ozarks & Branson areas from the 80s up until the early 2010s as I had family that lived near Lebanon & Cassville, MO.
When my (audiophile) dad passed away, my mum sold all the hifi gear, which she couldn't operate, and bought one of these. She has been really pleased with it, and I think it's great too.
Matt is one of them people that has such an engaging personality, and enthusiasm for what he's talking about, that he could make a video about a paving slab and it'd be interesting
Mans got a talent. Gotta give him that. I came here for vinyl collection and tips and advice and have subsequently learnt even more on top because of his enthusiasm and engaging nature. And opened and even deeper, larger, much more galactic black hole in my wallet….
They hawked these things _so hard_ here in the US in the 90s and 00s. You couldn't go a single commercial break in any show you were watching without an ad for one of these. They had hour long infomercials about them. You couldn't escape the Bose Wave. It was everywhere. And yet, I never saw one in person. But they had a sort of mythical quality around them.
@@treelineresearch3387this is also due to technological progress slowing down. XP feels recent because it's the basis of modern Windows, while we went from 8bit microcomputers to Windows 95 in 10 years. Also, DOS felt ancient because it was primitive and quite outdated even in its own time, already in 1985 the Amiga had a windows-like OS.
@@treelineresearch3387 same here pretty much. That is also kind of why I think of all the games, movies and anime made in this period and after it as rather recent
I’ve had a Bose Wave Radio/CD since 1997. Been in daily use ever since. Everything still works perfectly, including the vacuum fluorescent display and the laser for the CD player. Can’t even remember what I paid for it. Still sounds great and the alarm clock function wakes me up every day, playing greet sounding music. What a pleasure.
I miss shopping in physical stores. Half the time wouldn't even buy anything. Just run down to the local electronics store to wander around and see what cool stuff they have.
I live in a small town (less than 8,000) and I travel into Sydney often for work. It's actually incredibly boring to walk around now, all the shops are just overpriced clothes, nothing interesting. Sydney is lovely and the sightseeing is fantastic but shopping everywhere is just shit.
It's not even fun to meander around a target anymore. And we got secret shoppers too? Not worth it. On the bright side, the aggressive and manipulative way advertising has become actually makes me spend way, way less money on anything
In the 90's, early 2000's, a lot of businesses (at least in California) used the Bose Wave players for background music, especially small businesses with waiting rooms.
We bought one for our grandmother. She absolutely loved it and is now playing music every time we stop by and see her. She loves the way it sounds and how easy it is to use. Love or hate Bose, they nailed this one.
I bought one over 10 years ago after hearing my uncle's. It is a great little radio. The most bass I've heard come out of such a small radio at kitchen listening levels.
Growing up in the early 2000s my grandparents had one of these bose units, not sure which one exactly. Whenever we drove out of the city to visit them for a few days i remember i'd wake up with the morning radio playing on the unit and my dad making pancakes for everyone. It's associated with a lot of good memories.
I remember seeing one of these at my (very wealthy) childhood friends house. I never heard it switched on but it had a really attractive design and I knew it was expensive. Years later I got a set of Bose Companion 5 PC speakers used. I remember reading reviews on how people said Bose was a terrible speaker company but the price was good so I bought it. I had a very similar experience when I first heard them. Amazed at the quality and clarity of the sound, also how incredibly loud you could put the volume with no distortion. I just sat for a few hours enjoying my music. People seem to be overly harsh on Bose because of their high prices but not everyone wants to build a whole Hi-Fi system. I like the way they sound.
@@bobbygetsbanned6049 I love my big floor-standers and mono-blocks, and I'd never buy a Bose system purely on cost/performance grounds, but saying they are the worst is just a big plate of under-cooked bollocks! Do you by any chance use felt tip pens to make your CD's sound better?
I think that it's because "audiophiles" love to tinker with their setup, which Bose doesn't really lend itself. Also they are very aware of the components inside the hardware and Bose is notorious for their cheap paper drivers, which brought to the "overpriced crap" perspective. I personally find their products sound good. Sure, they are heavily equalized by design, but it's a sound that was researched to please the majority of listeners.
I had a roommate in college (early 2000s) that had gotten one of the basic Wave radio/CD players as a graduation present. It was perfect for an apartment, rich sound without overwhelming bass. Especially for being so compact. He was a musician and I constantly listened to music, so that thing got a lot of use.
I don't understand though. Surely there's a reason that bookshelf speakers or micro hi-fi speakers have wooden enclosures. Can the equally (or more) expensive BOSE Wave radio really produce the same or better sound out of a plastic boombox of sorts? 🤔
@@TassieLorenzono I don't think so, but boomboxes did tend to be larger and little micro systems of course were more complicated with more pieces. I'm not a Bose fan although I remember an aunt or possibly Uncle having one of these Wave radios when I was growing up and it got a ton of use. You got to remember sometimes having music in the home isn't always 100% about sound quality, sometimes it's about convenience. A lot of these Hi-Fi audio enthusiast, which I consider myself one, forget that. That's what the Bose Wave radio did very well, you can plug it in you can put on the radio or a CD and it sounded good enough and you didn't have to think about anything and it just made listening to music not only enjoyable but also convenient.
@@TassieLorenzoWood (MDF really most of the time) is used because it's heavy, durable, cheap, don't vibrate and absorbs sound; if you use a good plastic, thick and rigid to avoid vibrations and with good sound deadening you can obtain good sound from it too. And I'm not talking theoretically, I have a pair of JBL speakers made from plastic and relatively small that sound much better than you would expect.
My father is probably the typical customer type for this product line - not an audiophile, just someone who wanted a high quality, unobtrusive radio with a pleasing design. He has one FM/AM model in his bedroom and one with the top loader cd in a small living room. Both radios are from the late 90s and have worked flawlessly ever since.
I got to know Bose back in college in the early 80s. Their small speakers (201s?) had incredible sound, especially for their size. They were perfect for me at a time when I moved often and lived in sometimes tiny places. I liked them so much that I later had no hesitation in buying a set of (wired, non-noise-cancelling) Bose headphones. Both of these Bose items stayed with me for decades, and I've only ever had a very positive attitude about this company. I heard one of the first generation Bose waves when they first came out. My sister-in-law got one for just the reason they were sold: a small, easy to use, unobtrusive unit with excellent sound. I was blown away by the audio it put out. It was truly hard t believe. When I had heard she bought one, I thought she was crazy to spend the kind of money they cost. But then I actually heard it. Wow.
Back in 2001 I spent about 10x the cost of those awful (when new) cheap bedside clock radios on a Bose Wave CD/Radio/Clock. Considering I still dose off and wake to its lovely sound daily consider it a worthwhile spend. I mostly aux input phone but the CD player and radio still works fine. It does have control buttons on the top load CD player lid, a couple of them were a bit flaky for a few years, so just used the remote, but seem to have fixed themselves (maybe some contact resistance sorted itself out). Also have a similar experience with QC Headphones, got them in the US in 2004 and when the side arm fractured in 2008 they were replaced without question by Bose NZ! Still use them, have once replaced the ear cushions as the foam degraded but otherwise still going strong.
I'm a millennial and I've always found Bose stuff to be pleasing to the eye, well put together, and with impressive sound. Plus expensive of course. I was also raised by a boomer GM automotive technician, so I associate Bose with Cadillac & Corvettes, etc. I was dumbfounded in the late 2000s to find the internet full of audiophiles saying Bose was trash. Yeah, the stuff is overpriced for what it is and the target market isn't sophisticated audiophiles -- it's plug and play general consumers. But I'm glad to see I'm not the only one that likes their stuff. Bose feels sleek and fancy in a way other products don't.
I’m one of those guys who was lucky enough to have worked in his chosen field(s) for most of his life. That multifaceted field is “Stuff You Watch And/Or Listen To”. The vast majority of Bose products were completely un-affordable to me for a very long time. I could buy ‘em NOW, but the Bose stores are gone, and there are other brands that have competed nicely with the entire Bose line, so I could never justify the “Over-Price” of anything that said Bose on it. However, when I heard the VERY small Bose “Companion II” computer speakers some years ago (we’re talking “late in the 20th Century” here - like, the 1990’s). They blew me away with the sound they made. I ended up buying 2 sets of ‘em! They have always worked fine, and each set has outlived several computers. Now, I’m going to take the oldest pair over to my little recording studio, so they can be the computer’s audio monitors there. They’re just the right size to fit under the computer’s two (video) monitors, if I turn the speakers on their sides. They should sound pretty amazing - and this pair is the older of the two! The very first TV Director I ever mixed audio for ended up (after we had worked together) as a Post-Production “Mucky-Muck” at CBS Television City in Hollywood. I was surprised to find, in a BIG room (about the size of a Supermarket, if memory serves) DOZENS of Broadcast-Quality video recorders (with each one set up to record News from every TV station in L.A., along with a number of satellite TV News sources, simultaneously) and each of these machines had its own pair of “Companion II’”s. I have no idea how many recorders and speaker-sets it added up to, but I’d never seen so many of these things, all in one room, in my life!
When I was a kid in the mid-80's my family bought one of the first generation Acoustic Wave systems (the ones in the big bag). It was INCREDIBLE at the time - in fact I was in marching band in high school and to practice our formation marching we recorded the band playing then played it back in the stadium - using ONLY my Acoustic Wave as it literally filled the ENTIRE STADIUM with sound. Truly a breakthrough product. My Bose AM5 Acoustimass speakers from the early 90's are still on my wall right now belting out music and movies to this day. Bose may get shit from some but NOT from me.
Saw one on the Fresh Prince back in the day, and thought it was the coolest thing I'd ever seen - but sadly out of reach for a 13yo in the UK at the time! Glad it didn't disappoint.
lol. You must have awful hearing abilities, if you are praising b0se! I owned a Phillips Woox radio... and it totally Trashed the B0se radio, in every possible metric... and it probably cost less than a third of the way Overpriced B0se radio. Maybe you should get your hearing checked. And or maybe actually go out and find some actual audiophile equipment to compare against. B0se isnt audiophile quality. They use the cheapest chinese drivers, that have ever been manufactured. They use some electronic methods, to make them sound "adequate".. and to help keep their low power woofers from distorting.
I was 14 when the early Acoustimass came out, and a wealthy friend of my father had a set. I loved them, but could never afford them. When I was 18 he bought a lifestyle 5, and I was amazed that he was able to buy an add-on amp and relocate the original speakers to his family room, and the remote worked through walls. It was so cool! Fast forward 15 years and my teenage lust got the better of me. I bought a 2nd hand powered AM5 system and loved it. Over the next 5-10 years I bought 3 more AM5s, and a lifestyle system. All 2nd hand, and for a budget price. I love them all. Only problems I’ve had was needing to change the leaky capacitors in the lifestyle control unit to restore the display brightness, and replace a fuse on a powered sub. One AM5 setup is mounted in my rolling tool cart in my garage. It’s 6’ high, 8’ long and 1.5’ deep. Sub down the bottom, a denon mini amp & cd unit to drive it, and the dual cubes in the corners. My mates think it sounds awesome, and so do I. I love the AM5s. They’re good enough for me.
Amen brother I’m the exact same way, still have 96’ cinemate speakers on the wall and boy oh boy do they perform. Glad to see fellow BOSE enthusiasts in the comments 💙
I still have my acoustic wave system made in 1998. The CD player died so long ago I can't remember, but the radio and aux in still work perfectly. That thing has moved house more than ten times, it endured teenage house parties, has a cigarette burn across the top, had beer spilt all over it more times than enough... still sounds absolutely brilliant cranked up. I feel like that thing is part of my family at this point and I'd quite like to be buried with it.
this is how i feel about the bose my parents keep in the kitchen!! Lived through 5 kids, countless parties, christmases, new years eves.. summer dinners where we would eat outside and the bose would be cranking out a sound track over drinks and dining. Its really part of the family aha.
i love my little bose wave! i inherited it from a family friend and it introduced me to so many fun things, like local college radio stations and the joy of spending too much money on cds. i've had it for around 6 years now and i can confidently say that this little box has completely changed the way i listen to music for the better. it holds a special place in my heart and i'm glad you had a good experience with it :)
Much of the attitudes towards Bose depends on when you first encountered their products. My first experience with them was early on, when they introduced the first generation of the 901 speaker in the late 1960s. To those of us "audiophiles" who were into accuracy, clarity, stereo imaging, etc., the 901 struck us as a total gimmick designed to fool the "less informed" customer that Bose had invented a magic speaker that was small in size but sounded huge. I think that's where a lot of the animus against the company began. Following the 901, they introduced the "sound cube" systems that had the tiny satellite speakers and a small subwoofer you were supposed to hide somewhere like under a couch. (They claimed to have invented this idea, but there were others who did it before them) Again, Bose claimed superb sound, but the reality was much different. They had to cross over to the sub at a much higher frequency because the little cubes had virtually no bass capability on their own. This created a giant bass "hole" and made the sub location very audible. So again, the audiophiles poo pooed these products as junk, which isn't to say they didn't sell well.....they did. The later lifestyle products like the the wave radios moved far outside the realm of audiophile interest, but the lngering suspicion of Bose "pulling a fast one" remained. That said, Bose was never geared towards that group in the first place, and for their target audience, their products were really quite well designed.
Used to have a Bose Acoustimass subwoofer and it seemed like it was not far off a foghorn tuned to 60hz, it could put out a lot of volume and power but no proper low-end at all and everything sounds like it's coming from a subwoofer instead of the bass blending it the other speakers. A lot like the subwoofers that come with cheap computer speakers but way louder (and heavier). Not like this is comparing with super expensive audiophile gear, vs a cheap 10" JVC or 8" Wharfedale home theatre sub of the same age that is about the same size and weight it's like a different kind of speaker.
Yes, audiophiles were also suspicious that they never provided the technical specifications (frequency range, distortion, etc) and used some dubious tricks in their listening rooms to make the Bose system sound better. The principle seemed to be to cheaply produce a sound the customer would like without worrying about accurate reproduction. A home comparison of those early Bose systems with a decent quality system of a similar price would show the difference. But Dr Bose himself was an excellent audio engineer, and I heard that he did some ground-breaking work on noise cancellation for the military (pilot comms). The company had some clever marketing though, and were constantly offering existing customers trade-ins on their old systems for new products to keep them in the Bose fold. I assume that these days their audio systems, particularly headphones, are now reasonably good quality & value, but it's hard for old-timers to shake off an early bad impression.
I have a Bose Wave Music System from 2005 with the CD changer that’s in need of a recap (the CD will no longer reliably read on the main unit or the changer). I also have the same system you are demonstrating on this video. When I got the first Wave Music System the main unit wouldn’t play a CD without freezing up. I called the Bose customer service line and they sent out a new one that day before I had even sent the defective one back. They arranged for Fed Ex to pick up the defective one the next day at my house. If their customer service is still like that it is second to none. On the Soundtouch, if you ever change internet providers, it’s quite the pain to get it to switch to the new Wi-Fi. Just went through that a few days ago and after a few hours I finally got it back online and working. They really are great little systems for what they are. Maybe a bit expensive but they can put out a lot of volume and sound pretty good. My wife can attest to that.
Bose designed a very funky active car suspension [Boss suspension YT ] into a Lexus LS400, it could predict when the front and rear wheels were going to contact a bump or obstacle and actually jump the car over it. Never went into production but ended up as seat in trucks/lorries and very comfortable. Look up the video, and watch a two ton car jump in the air. Thanks Matt
I saw a video on this a while ago and was kind of blown away. I didn't think about it until just now that a system that cancels out bumps is basically the exact same thing as noise cancelling.
As these were way out of my price range at the time, I looked around for something similar. I found the Creative Soundworks 740. Less than half the price, built like a tank and sounded amazing and went very loud. I bought another one for work in our warehouse and it sounded even better. As bluetooth speakers took off and streaming replaced CDs, I gave them both away. One to my friend's parents who are still using it 15 years later.
about 15 yrs ago i bought one of these Wave suckers, mine didnt have the CD player though, and no base unit, but i added a shark fin-looking thing that does the bluetooth connection. We moved into a new apt and while we were unboxing and putting stuff together people stopped by to say hello, and they heard this "little" radio that sounded amazing. I think about 6 people bought them in the building. Now it sits in the bedroom and i use it all the time. I love Bose products.
@@RobertR3750 I guess, i still say it sounds great. Because we liked that Wave so much we bought the Bose TV sound system for the living room. It has two little speakers with stands for the side and one big sub and i think it's amazing. Looks cool too. When my iphone had a jack, i also had the Bose green headphones for exercise and they were amazing.
Bose customer service is amazing, they work on the serial number not receipt for warranty claims and they warranty the product and not the user. So as a 2nd owner, I got a free replacement when my unit failed, with no receipt of sale.
Having a background in professional audio, I mainly heard the "no highs, no lows, Bose" sentiment when talking about PA systems, because Bose PA systems are (were? - it's been a while) notorious for being optimized for speaking voice, and speaking voice only.
I remember being saddled with 802's and 302's back in the day for live use, with their silly little system controller that used to get red hot and fail... Hated Bose then and now! Overpriced junk IMO.
I think the sentiment came from their much earlier surround systems. Meanwhile, I have a set of Bose computer speakers and I got the opposite problem It's all Highs and all Lows. Not really complaining because that's what I mostly want from my video games anyways. It's a pretty impressive amount of bass for such small speakers, too.
Well, you can guess that the same 'optimization' is true of the Wave radio in this review. Vocals were "very clear". Where do vocals typically fall into? Midrange. Back in the 80's, I went to an "amazing" Acoustimass demo. (I'm probably not spelling it right: this was the 5 cubes & a sub system.) They actually gave the demo disc as a free gift. I played that demo disc at home on my meager system with bookshelf speakers (or, it might have been my own small stereo at the time -- nowhere near the price range of the Bose system.) Something didn't sound right when I played the 1812 Overture section from the demo CD. I found my own CD with a performance of that: BOOM! --Real, dangerous bass, rattling the limits of my meager system, as it should. The Bose demo CD, rather than being "full dynamic range", was actually TUNED to limit the bass in a strange way that sounded "great" on a Bose system, but sounded like thin garbage on any real system designed to play REAL audio signals at full range. I 100% stand by the "No highs, no lows, must be Bose" statement. Because it's not a joke. Bose products are the poster children for 'Rip-offs'.
There was a stadium in the States that Bose convinced to let them do the sound for with their "clever" (ie, shedloads of teeny speakers all over the place). Within a year they ripped it all out and got JBL in.
My grandmother had a Wave radio, situated atop her TV cabinet, for many years. I have fond memories of listening to it with her. Come to think of it, she had a bit of an eye for good electroncis: that TV cabinet, for example, housed a widescreen Sony Trinitron. Anyway, I recall she'd promised me that when she passed away, she'd let me have the Wave, but much to my dismay, another family member beat me to it and sold it off. Oh well. When I used to work estate sales, these were very common, and yet surprisingly popular. There was one guy who would turn up to nearly every sale I worked in search of Waves. Granted, I think he was reselling them, but still.
I don't like Garmin because they bought out DeLorme GPS and took off the market the best GPS on the market. I still have it somewhere but forget exactly what it's called(Street Atlas) but you just have to plug the GPS antennae into a usb port on your laptop and install the driver and mapping software and data and turn your laptop into a big GPS. I bought it back around 2002-3 for ~$110.00 and it was worth every penny for an otr truck driver, far superior to any $700.00 model with a 7 inch screen. I still don't know if there's anything like it on the market.
Watch series like Magnum PI and other older movies from the 70s and 80s: many/most pilots have Bose headphones. They made these much longer and didn’t switch there.
I don’t do a lot of commenting on TH-cam videos but I had to add my thoughts on this excellent review! I am a Bass guitar player of 50 years plus so I know what good bass sounds like. In my opinion Bose units of any type deliver excellent bass balanced with great mids and highs! The “no highs, no lows, must be Bose” cliche is repeated by many people who don’t have a clue about balanced sound from units that actually fit in to home spaces without dominating them. I own many Bose units, from small blue tooth speakers to complete surround sound systems with dual sub woofer boxes and they all delight my ears! If you are considering Bose, use your ears, not “influencers”! And 10 out of 10 for this balanced TH-cam review!
So many ignorant remarks from people who've never heard current generation Bose first hand. It has an amazingly balanced sound, with an outstanding layered bass, that you'll find only in more expensive speakers. And that's a shame. I wish that they would've continued manufacturing these wonderful devices. I have two. One is the latest fourth generation, which is by far the superior one, with a wonderful layered bass and clear and powerful sound with superb mids. The second is a fifteen year old, that is recently showing its age and the CD stops playing after about 50 minutes. I'll probably buy a used fourth generation, to replace the faulty one. Highly recommended. It's a shame it's discontinued.
Well, as a fellow bass player of over 50 years' experience, I'm afraid I have to disagree. Yes of course, always use your ears; and if *you* like the "Bose sound" then that's great. But *my* ears tell me there's just something "wrong" about the way Bose kit sounds. And personally, I always find it difficult to trust any claims from a company that refuses to publish specs.
I can remember infomercials for the Wave radio (here in the U.S.) back in the 90's. I always thought it looked like it would be amazing, but at the price they were offering I'd have to continue to wonder. One day in the 11th grade, 1996, my art teacher brought his in and had it going in the classroom one day. I remember even all these years later how blown away I was by the sound (compared at least to anything I'd heard in person to that point).
As a kid, I did think the Bose Wave was a overpriced Radio Alarm clock, only because I'd only ever seen them in magazine adverts, and never seen one in real life, and in the printed ads they looked a lot smaller, it wasn't until much later when I saw one I realised how big they were and that they looked like a higher quality product than they looked in the magazines ads.
The manual says to place the back of this unit within 2 feet of a wall. It produces plenty of bass. It won't make your ears bleed or thump your chest nor will it keep your neighbors awake during the wee hours, but you wouldn't expect that from a unit this size.
@@StreetPreacherr That was my impression on the system when I bought mine at a thrift store for $40 (£30.47.) At the price I bought that radio for, it's the best sounding system I've ever owned at $40. However, at their retail price of $599.99 US (£699.00 retail price in UK), these systems are way too overpriced and I can understand the Bose hate on their price alone. Personally, I wouldn't spend more than $249 (£190) max on these systems.
@@StreetPreacherr Yes they suck and are over priced. Only their headphones maintained a pretty good reputation over the years, but they aren't cheap either.
I bought one just for fun and placed on a shelf in my shop and I have been working on something with volume on about 60% and more than once would just stop and listen to instruments I have never heard before in that particular song and the clarity in amazing…. It’s a series one !!! Loved your video …
My PS5 does that trick too, since my cabinet happens to be a big hollow wooden box. Every time the disc is spinning it sounds as if a propeller plane is passing by.
Once again thanks for a snap back in time. I remember everything about these wave speakers. I went on to be an electronics tech in the US Navy and I maintained a high powered 3D RADAR. When going through training for that radar he brought in his BOSE waveguide to show us how radar waves traveled down a waveguide (it can handle tons of power vs a cable and no frequency issues). Anyway I fondly remember these Bose units and when I first saw one in a friends house I was pretty impressed.
I remember these used to be everywhere about a decade ago, nice to see you covering it. I would honestly consider getting one if they deprecated a bit more, but they're holding their value quite well on the used market.
My grandparents had one of older models for the CD playing ability. In fact, I think they still might. I haven't been to their house in a while though. And I remember thinking it looked cool as a kid.
My Nissan Qashqai Tekna has a Bose sound system and we have one of their older iPod docks in our bedroom for listening to music and they truly are amazing - beautiful, clear sound, and a deep bass. Absolutely amazing for someone who wants a small but powerful sound system for their bedroom or study - the ultimate middle-class simple sound system ;-) and worth every penny.
FYI the "highs lows"...thing is for the tiny Bose satellite speakers/sub combo. Those lacked high frequency from the sats, couldn't go low enough, then there was large gap between sub and speaket, and the sub didn't go that low either (and have a lot of distortion)
From my experience with several different versions of the satellite systems, that is not true. Not attempting to start an argument, just saying that unless you were attempting to duplicate an actual concert or maybe an IMax movie (both of which are painfully loud to my ears) was there any distortion. Bose usually has an active EQ rolling off frequencies and boosting others to combat distortion. Having said that, the satellite speaker systems where you provided the amp did have distortion issues because of the lack of an active EQ. My 901s (from the 70's) I used to own many years ago actually struggled to sound good at all, regardless of EQ/bass treble adjustments. Active EQ was necessary to "tune" an amplifier's output curves to match the speaker. I think that's why they used to push the optional amp/driver when you bought the 901s.
@@MrVolksbeetle The bose sats roll off around 14-16khz, reach down to about 200hz, and there is a massive gap between sat and bass module, then the sub doesn't reach that low. When I demoed one, it was all port noise and distortion. Absolute junk for the price. The only good thing is how wide and diffused the speakers were, but any bipole (which they are doing) would act the same, then you can get larger models with say 5" woofers to produce far cleaner midbass and bass from the cabinet. There was scientific paper done on the bose sats years ago. Also the driver inside the bose was really cheap about 50p. Thin plastic housing and no wadding.
@@johnsmith-i5j7i There is a difference between hearing and listening. I’ve found throughout the years that most folks don’t know the difference. Specs, driver size, cost and other such waffling on doesn’t really mean that much. I’ve demoed cheap, expensive, mediocre and world class. Everyone one of them have the same weakness: the space/room they’re going into. It’s the same conundrum when shopping for a TV: does your house have 15-30’ ceilings? It is lit by 3 dozen (or more) fluorescent lights? Is your viewing room 12,000 sqft? Warehouses and acoustic trickery can make or break a demo. Most unlike any other audio company, Bose will let you audition any product to make sure where you listen is satisfactory to reproduce what you listen to with what they sell. For the 1-3% of folks who listen with specs and paperwork, their products don’t cut the mustard. They’ll happily spend 3-10 times the amount on “audiophile” equipment. The question is: who is getting the best experience? Both is the answer. Judging someone because they enjoy something based on your perspective of what does and doesn’t have value is a fools errand. Ultimately, it doesn’t really matter. If you’re happy with your setup, and they’re happy with their setup, who cares?
I bought a secondhand Bose Wave AWRCC6 Music System AM/FM Radio CD Remote In Platinum White about 2 years ago. I also got the dab radio module and added a 3.5mm Bluetooth adapter. Sounds great and no issues. I am not missing WiFi which seems the only thing your newer model has. Thank you for an informative video Matt.
We actually did have one of these as our kitchen radio for years, starting back in the 90s...I think it might still be in my parents' kitchen after all these years.
Wow, I remember going to a demonstration of an early Bose wave back in the 90's. This was way before bluetooth was a thing. They literally had it behind a curtain and played some music. I was honestly really impressed by the sound and thought it was a setup with large speakers. Then they revealed it was a small device about the same size as any other portable audio device of the day. It also was incredibly expensive at the time. I'll never forget this experience.
Thank you for being honest. I love the idea of this as I wanted a radio and a cd to plug into my existing active speakers. I settled for a Majority Robinson 2 which is an amazing little radio screen without speakers and a Yamaha separate CD player.
A friend of mine bought one of these back in the day, and asked me to listen to it, since I was a recording engineer. I listened to some favorite songs and I know he expected me to say it was amazing, because of the "hype" (The hype was really just advertising, not so much word-of-mouth) I said what I thought. The thing sounds amazing for a box sitting on your counter with maybe two inch drivers. It does not rival even decent speaker sets in the commercial range. It's nowhere as bright or refined or accurate as studio reference monitors, but it sounds really solid in the middle, which is awesome. It filled the room while being tiny. Good stuff! Then he asked the dreaded question: "Would you buy this for $750?" I changed the subject.
Great video, I seem to remember the issue was that in the early 2000's they had a lot of competition from mini hi fi systems from Denon, Onkyo and Yamaha. All of these systems had the same functionality at a cheaper price and the sound quality of those systems was just as good as the Bose. Around that time I bought an Onkyo and it still works and has all of the features of the system Bose were selling in 2005.
I think the problem with Bose is not that their stuff is bad, it just tends to be quite pricey for what it is. Like with the headphones, you can get Sennheiser or Grado ones that sound just as good for less money. Even the Wave systems tended to be more expensive than a decent bookshelf setup. My grandma had one, I want to say bought in the late aughts. So some quick Waybackmachine, the base unit at the time was $459 Beaver Bucks, or about $664 today. That was with just the radio, no CD. If you wanted the CD player, like my gran had, it was $699 ($1,011 today). Where as you can buy a higher end Panasonic stereo 3-way bookshelf system, with CD, Bluetooth, and Airplay, right now for under $600 regular price. We did inherit the Bose Wave after my gran passed. It does indeed sound good for its size. But that's its only real advantage.
I think that these were maligned because of the price and they were also caught in the wake of Bose speakers. I've owned quite a lot of them myself and that's because my first speakers were Bose 201s that I got in 8th grade. They looked cool, they sounded better than a boom box, and because I didn't just shove them into opposite corners of the room like my parents did with their rack system speakers, I thought they sounded great. I bought 301s later, my parents got 201s and 101s eventually (the later plasticky ones), and I got a pair of 401s and some 6.2s used. I always thought the 401s looked so cool and I still do. I was just trapped in the ecosystem. After getting a little annoyed with the direct/reflecting sound and speakers sounding out of phase after I became a bit more critical, I decided to try some used Paradigm Titans (not Titan Monitors, the older ones from Paradigm's less expensive line). I plopped them on top of my 401s and found that they did everyting better. These value-line speakers had more clarity, cleaner bass, and actually a wider but more define sound stage. THAT is why people dislike Bose-- years and years of mediocre speakers that were surrounded by a veil of mystique and forbidding prices. Also, by this time, the cube speakers + acoustimass woofers were what Bose was most widely known for. Another speaker that made an impact in the show room, but once you really listened to music on them they were very middle-of-the-road. By the time these wave radios came out, people who were already critical of Bose were in a "Fool me once/fool me for 30 years" mindset. I was. I kind of still am.
We get these regularly at the thrift shop I volunteer at, and they move fast! Very high demand, and they go from the $75 or so up to $300 for the open box newest models
The "no highs, no lows" comes from sound engineers faced with mixing live bands through the ubiquitous 802II model which a lot of mid range rental houses had bought many of. No tweeters, no subs, just 8 x 4.5 inch drivers per cabinet. They were loud and that's about all the good I have to say about them.
When I was interested in Home Audio, the catchphrase I would hear was, "Bose, better sound through advertising." based on their omnipresent advertising in every possible media. Their products were quite expensive as well.
I recently bought a late-gen Bose Wave Radio at a thrift store for, get this, $10 USD. The CD player was glitching, but literally just opening it up and moving the laser back and forth and putting it back together fixed it. The sound quality is ASTONISHINGLY good. Unbelievably powerful and balanced sound for the package. As much as I appreciate a cool vintage sound system like Marantz or Sansui, I'd say 99% of people would be perfectly served with one of these, and most of those people would experience a serious upgrade. Oh and it has an AUX IN, so consider it one gadget away from Bluetooth capable... :-)
A friend of mine has had one of these for over twenty years and uses it regularly, and I was amazed with the sound quality when I first heard it, considering the size of the unit itself. He admitted he was very skeptical about them when he saw the adverts, but after a demo in a Bose shop and the 30-day trial they were offering he took the plunge and was converted in about three hours.
My ex has a Soundlink Mini; those things are tiny; you could fit one in a cargo pants pocket, but the sound it puts out is you'd think there was a 4" driver in them.
My parents have had 2 or 3 since the 90's and still use them to this day. And in the same era when i was living in apartments, the Bose 3 piece speaker systems were convenient for packing and moving every few years. So while Bose may have been overpriced in terms of what audiophiles thought they should cost, they offered a good compromise for many people. Coincidentally, I only learned that the stores and much of their prior product lines had closed and been discontinued in the last couple of months. Timely and excellent video.
Around 20 years ago I bought the CD/radio player/clock as a bedside alarm. It was terrifically expensive, but top quality. I sent it back after the trial as I couldn't justify the cost. Then I spent a couple of months looking for another radio alarm clock, but none of them came near to being as good. What I especially liked was the automatic dimmer on the display so it didn't light up the whole bedroom in the middle of the night. Eventually I decided that the Bose was worth the money after all so I bought another one and I've been happily using it ever since. The one I have loads CDs in the top and has all the main buttons on the CD lid with a remote control having a useful subset of the functions. I've always been very pleased with it and I'm sad to learn that they've been discontinued.
The clock displays tend to be not quite so bright now, if they've been left on for most of 20 years. I wouldn't mind if I could find a replacement VFD display for my three but it is the basic nature of VFD displays that they are all bespoke.
A couple thoughts I have had about these while spending countless hours at the Goodwill outlet. 1)When they were first introduced, they definitely sounded better than most comparable items that size. 2)They sure must have made these for a long time, because I have seen several similar but slightly different versions of the same device. 3) They must have sold more of these than I thought, because I commonly see these in the bins. 4) Bose sold people an exclusive experience, you could not purchase these at common retailers here in the USA back in the 80s. 5) They must be decently made because so many of the early models are still working today.
I’ve always liked Bose regardless of what “audiophiles” online would say. Same of Bose old speakers sound great. My mate still has an old Bose 301 pair for his record player corner and it sounds nice.
I remember seeing ads for these all the time, and being very skeptical of their claims. In any case, I'd never have paid that kind of money for something, especially back then. Pleased to know they did actually live up to the hype.
I worked for a company that helped market Bose Wave radios, back in the 1990s. I chose not to do that campaign. The folk who did got a free one. I wish I had done the campaign now! A pal from then I’m still in touch with still has his. It still works, and still sounds great. Great video.
My grandma listened to a classical music station out of Chicago on one of these in their breakfast room while she ate breakfast or did her cross-stitches. She passed in ‘21 but my grandpa still listens to that radio every day. It had a great big sound to my tiny kid-ears.
I also have some from that time, but everything I own from 1995 still works fine .... all my tape decks, my mini-disc players, my CD players ..... even computers! All work fine from 1995 ... you know what doesn't work well? My electronics from 5 years ago. ALL recent tech is made to become obsolete in a few years.
@@baseddoggie sure but caps are easy to replace! New tech gets killed when an online server goes offline..... Anything from the 90s is more maintainable than whatever we produce today. I have re-capped a few vintage computers and other devices... It's really not that hard!
@@AlTheEngineer im not denying that, it still sucks replacing caps. I have heaps of 80s stuff that still has perfectly fine caps and then you hit the early 2000s and they all have gone bad by now. It's just annoying
@@baseddoggie Sure, but even 80's caps will eventually die. that's just the nature of these micro-electronics. To me personally, as long as I can replace them, I'm happy with the product. When they make a product IMPOSSIBLE to repair, I simply don't buy it. So yeah late 90s early 2000s era caps were not the best, but they still lasted 20, 30+ years - I can't name a single modern device that will last that long.
I used to work a few doors down from the Bose store in Manchester's Trafford Centre. I walked past as they'd just opened one morning and they were playing an album at a fair volume, and i stopped to listen for about 10 minutes. Eventually their demo sold me on a CD i would never have thought of buying normally (Childish Gambino - Awaken, My Love!) I think audiophiles take issue with the "colouring" of the sound that comes from Bose's tuning etc. I get the theory on that but their kit really made that style of production shine. Most people don't care about all the holy grail stuff that audiophiles do. Much like B&O i always saw Bose as a lifestyle brand over purist audio.
There used to be a Bose store in the Opry Mills mall in Nashville, TN, USA. I don't remember it closed before the flood that closed the mall for a few years or if the flood was the end of it.
When the first Wave unit came out, Bose was trying to get people to be part of their in-home demonstration team. I went to a sales pitch at their store in their small theater. The sound was provided by a Sony Betamax with PWM adapter (about the only way you could do digital audio back then). The advert was impressive sound though their 901 speakers. Only, they weren't 901s. At the end, they opened up the speaker cabinets to show it was really a wave radio. The other thing, their research showed that people appreciate good audio, but a number (particularly women) were turned off by the complexity of stereos and particularly the stereo buying experience. That's why the wave was super simple to operate and why they wanted in-home demonstrators.
My grandpa got one in 2007 and gave me his 70s Pioneer. In the early 80s he saw records were going out of style and dubbed his collection to the format of the future, 8-Track.
What a coincidence! I've never heared about this device before, and haven't been on vacation for over 10 years. It just so happened, that I finally went for one just 2 days after this video's release, and the accommodation had one of these. I was so thrilled when I noticed!! Turns out that you were quite right. Such base from such a small device was a surprise, not being able to connect my phone without the addon however was less of a joy. Still, I can attest, that if you only have some small shallow rack space for sound, this baby can deliver way above what most would expect. Thanks!
My mother bought a WAVE Radio on her own when I actually worked at a stereo store selling stereo equipment for a living. (I could have gotten her a discount on anything else she wanted - or, more likely, that I recommended to her!) I was a bit aghast when I found that out, but then I visited her one day and saw where she'd put it and listened to it and it was honestly the first time I realized that hey, you know, maybe there actually aren't absolutes in audio. She had it on her nightstand, she did use it as an alarm clock but she also just used it to have the radio on throughout her apartment. And she loved it. And I had to admit, it really sounded pretty good for what it was. It was definitely the best sounding clock radio I'd ever heard. That overall experience did start to change the way I thought about audio equipment. These systems do get too much hate; it's not deserved.
My first intro to Boss was the.commercials. You couldn't buy them in store only over the phone with a credit card, so my natural reaction was to think it was a scam. I was a bit surprised to find out later that they went mainstream and when I finally got to try one it was actually pretty good, as compared to my regular CD player.
I had a set of Bose Bookshelf speakers many years ago in my youth. They were the best speakers I've ever had! They had great bass but nothing earth shaking and the treble was loud and clear. Those speakers sound so much bigger than they actually are. They would be a great choice for people with a limited amount of space. I really miss my Bookshelf's, they were awesome!
I had known of the usual jokes made about Bose back in their days, but never looked into it, mostly because of the crazy prices they asked for even simple kitchen radios. Then recently I moved from a car with a Harman-Kardon audio system to one with a Bose system, and ohmygod how can 50+ years of audio engineering experience produce such a weak sound quality?! I feel like they've forgotten to put in the crossovers.. the subwoofer plays mids, the tweeters play mids, the door speakers try their very best to cover for the lack of the other ones.. yes it's loud and moderately clear, but it's far from "good" for an audio upgrade option that cost 1500$ to order.
It all depends on the car. I would say the 90s through mid 2000s was the BOSE heyday for car audio, but only in cars that actually got a good system. Likewise, there were PLENTY of lame sounding H/K systems in car audio. IMO, BOSE was far superior to H/K during the heyday period I mentioned. I have assessed that post-2010, H/K has gotten a lot better.
@@kevin9c1 Anything from GM with the "Bose" system was just licensed marketing, Bose had nothing to do with the cars sound at all except GM paid to use the name and they were all equally crap. H/K does the same thing now days...none of the speakers in your car are made by those companies as they would cost too much. You might get a $1.50 driver vs the regular $1.00 driver but it's not going to be "the real deal" any way you put it.
@@ZboeC5 That's a gross generalization and therefore not true. BOSE automotive did design and engineering work for car audio. Who makes the driver is like saying GM doesn't make the car, it's just a collection of suppliers. It doesn't add any information to the discussion to say that.
i have the original wave radio, still works to this day(20yrs)! i have a 3rd generation i gave to my wife for her birthday; because of their incredible sound quality I've used them for small party functions. Nothing like the sound quality & durability in such a small package. Truly end of an era as with the store closing...😔🙂
I was gifted a Bose SoundLink Mini bluetooth speaker about 10 years ago, and to this day, whenever I bring it somewhere to play music people are blown away by how big the sound is coming from a 2 x 8 inch box.
same, try this and thank me later... when you go to bed, sit it above your head on your pillow faceing down towards your ears. sounds better than any speakeers headphones etc etc ive ever heard, its crazy.
The old "No highs, no lows" description came from before these small systems existed. From what I remember, it originated about fifty years ago in response to their floor standing and bookshelf speakers lack of response.
What you’re hearing with the string instruments is the rosin on the bow interacting with the metal strings. I was actually really impressed (listening through my TV!), because that’s how bowed instruments actually sound without any processing. They can indeed sound rather harsh.
I found that exact Bose Wave radio at a thrift store for $40 USD (£30.47.) As much as I love my radio, I feel like they're overpriced for $599 US (£699.00 retail price in UK.) I don't like that the radio does not have bass/treble adjustments or buttons on it. Other than that, I think it has a great for what it is, and I definitely got it at a steal for $40.
Had one of these wayyyy back when. It had a CD player on the top that popped open, no wifi or anything. LOVED it. Years later, ended up getting something called the Bose 1,2,3 or something like that. Was a setup that had 2 very small speakers that were to be placed on a shelf or wall on either side of your television. The third part, a crate-sized subwoofer that went on the side. The surround sound from that little thing was absolutely amazing & everyone who ever came over was sure to notice & mention it. I still have that 1,2,3 to this day! :)
Definitely miss the stores, we had a Wave Radio 3 and lost the remote to it during a move, walked into a Bose store and they gave us a new remote no questions asked.
I’m In Gilroy California. We’re a small community near the SF 🎉Bay and Monterey Bay, we had a Bose outlets here, opened in 1994. Closed in like 2006. They had a little theater inside with huge speakers. You watch/listen to like a 30 second clip then. Dramatically I might add, 2 employees got up to takeoff the fake speakers facade to reveal the little speakers. It was all quiet…. Well dramatic
I worked in retail back in the hey day of units like these from Bose and I can explain where some of the hate comes from: * Bose required special sales training for employees to sell their gear. * Bose required their gear to be set apart and not compared to any other equipment. * Bose required you to only use their specially tuned and equalized CDs to demonstrate their units. This meant "shoppers" could not get an accurate impression of Bose leading to disappointment in some when they got home or nose-high snobbishness in others. I found that people who wanted Boss, only bought Bose. There was no convincing them otherwise. I found that uninitiated customers heard our rule-breaking comparisons in sound rooms and never went with Bose once compared. Me personally, I found that Bose charged a premium but used shoddy materials wherever they could get away with it. * Paper cone woofers with untreated foam surrounds that disintegrated just after the warranty was out. * Plastic cases where wood should have been used. * Actual light bulbs inside their speakers to dampen wattage from external amplifiers. When the bulbs burned out, those channels were "blown". This video, however, was an excellent review and makes the great point that this product was made for certain situations and people, and it does what it was built for extremely well. Cheers!
Right I'm so confused, I endured many a sales pitch just to hear what their stuff actually sounded like, and suffice to say I was sufficiently less impressed than Mat is here. I guess this is a much newer version than the ones I heard, but based on my experience, I just can't imagine. Usually the people who love Bose haven't ever had real speakers, but he does, and I have no idea what's even going on anymore. Is this a part of the natural aging process, liking Bose eventually? I'm scared :P
I liked the way their in-ear headsets fit (with the little plastic hook). They were comfortable and if I fell asleep with them on they would still be in my ear when I woke up. The problem is the cable sheathing kept cracking and exposing the wires. Bose replace them once in-warranty, and gave me half-price two more times when they failed out-of-warranty. I finally gave up but if they had fixed the cable issue I would still be using them.
I absolutely love your set up. And having it all lit up and running is awesome. An old employer had a bose wave radio in the shop. It filled the entire shop, which held 7 vehicles and a spray booth, with sound. And talk about separation, in an area that size it was unbelievable.....this was in the mid-late 80"s.
I remember my first encounter with the Bose Wave was back in 1992. It blows my mind that they made this stereo as long as they did. It was impressive at the time. It was also quite expensive.
Years ago, before I retired, I had to travel to teach a project management class in my company’s Cambridge, MA office. I stayed at the Charles Hotel since it was across the street from our office. Instead of the usual crappy clock/ radio next to the bed, this hotel had a white Bose Wave radio (no CD). I was impressed with the sound coming out of this small radio on my night table. Years later I used my Citibank points to get a later version in black with the CD player. I also bought a larger remote control with lighted buttons at the Bose store near my home. Unfortunately that remote is made with the easy grip plastic that gets sticky after awhile. I finally removed the coating with some solvent. Still sounds great after all these years.
I remember going to an audio show in the US back in about 2004. I was with a group of people and we were ushered into this private Bose room where up the front were these massive floor standing speakers. About 4ft in height. This lady talked about the audio system and then we were played a demo. It nearly blew my head off, the power of the sound was absolutely outstanding. It was jaw dropping. Then the lady flicked the front off the massive speakers. They were fake empty boxes, inside were 2 tiny square Acustimass speakers. At that point i was sold !.
Well done. These absolutely were good products. They were expensive but impressive. I've had several myself and gifted a few. I had two of the original small version that only came in white and had buttons on the top. The quality was impressive and holds up to this day. And I've also had a couple of the versions just before the one you have here. There is still one in my kitchen, it works well to this day and the sound quality is quite good. One of these is the perfect thing for an audiophile who wants good sound with their clock radio, or these were perfect for someone who might have a small apartment and simply does not need a full system. The sound quality is terrific.
The ads for these thimgs always made wonder if they were a gimmick, and lots of know-it-alls dumped on Bose. But to my ears Bose stuff always sounds great, though it's often too pricey.
@@avsystem3142 That sounds like audiophile snob hogwash. I want audio equipment that sounds good. Bose sounds good. End of story. Like I said, my only problem with them is they are usually too expensive for me personally.
I got my Bose Wave radio/CD maybe 25 years ago, still quite happy with it. It no longer functions as my alarm clock, playing the news as I get ready for work, as I have since retired and wake up when it pleases me. Today it lives on top of the refrigerator in my kitchen where I mostly use it as a radio and clock. I did buy a Bluetooth adapter for it years ago. That works well enough but I never use it. When I want to really listen to sit down and music, a radio broadcast, or watch video I use the big component system in my living room. Honestly, I have been thinking of looking for a used Bose Wave for my little home office where I'm spending more time these days.
DAB is such an interesting, though terribly faulty radio standard. In Finland we had it from 1997 to 2005 when it was replaced with radio via internet streaming (and before anyone asks Finland has had unlimited internet data on 3G/4G/5G/6G(5G+) for 24 years). Do any countries still push this? (DVB-H was a similar nonsensical thing we had in Finland from 2004-2011, a digital tv broadcast to mobile phones. Yikes. I did have it on Nokia 7710 phone in 2004-2005, though.)
In EU passed a law that if you had an FM radio device it must also supports DAB. One of the result of this is that phones dropped FM support, instead of adding DAB. Thanks EU... Car radio have DAB and I know no one that uses it, mostly don't even know what it is
@@luca6819 I remember EU passing that law. All radios have supported DAB/DAB+ for such a long time already though - and I don't see any country dropping FM. Finland still has a 'dual' radio network - FM and internet radio. What comes to DAB, EU really didn't hear experts.
DAB is main means of radio transmission in the UK. Almost all new cars have DAB radios. FM is all but dead. Streaming radio hasn't really taken off as there are few Internet radios here.
I went to a demonstration of the original Wave radio when it was first introduced (I guess not the original according to your timeline, but the little clock radio one). I was a subscriber to Popular Science magazine as a kid and I assume that's where they got my name because I got a postcard in the mail when I was about 12 or 13 inviting me to a demonstration of a thing with bose, so I got my dad to take me. For the demonstration where they showed us a film and there were all these speaker boxes set up all over the place and the film had a lot of classical music and stuff in it. Near the end, some people came out and picked up each of the speaker boxes and held it up to show it was empty, and then finally picked up a box that was in the center, and lifted it up to reveal the little bose radio underneath. So yeah it was definitely sold as a full HiFi system except in a little unit
I am a Bose basher for sure, but I never thought the QC25s were low quality, the Wave systems I've heard sound great, but they're all silly expensive. I'm happy to hear they back them up though. My main issue with them was their sound plates and acoustimass "home theater" system. They really were quite weedy. Also it seems lots of their stuff does break. But hey, if you want to spend hundreds on a clock radio, that's up to you. Glad it does sound nice.
What Bose was always good at was punching above their size. They were never the best, but they were best for the size for a long time. For people who think audio systems should be heard and not seen, that made Bose the best.
About 6 months after I bought the QC25's, the cord went bad. I called Bose, all armed with my receipt and attitude, ready to go battle to get them to honor the warranty and replace it. The rep on the other end apologized profusely, asked for my name and address and assured me a replacement would arrive within the week.
"Don't you need proof of purchase, like a copy of my receipt or anything?" I asked.
He laughed and said, "The 25's haven't been out that long. They're all currently under warranty. No proof needed. Have a great day."
The replacement cord arrived in 2 days. Best customer service I've ever received, bar none.
I had the same experience when the Bose earphones I bought my dad stopped working. This actually happened twice and both times Bose replaced them without question.
My cord had the same fate and I got a replacement also free of cost without any fuss.
@@blue_jm sounds like it won't be long before they have a web form to just get a new cord... since they seem fragile.
This is to much work to set up..after all it's just a music system
All of those guys - internally called the Customer Focused Development Team - were let go and replaced with a call center in India, all at once. I remember the day it happened. We were all in shock.
Those guys were GENUINELY there to make sure customers were taken care of, and they were a great bunch of people to boot. Bose dropped them all like a bad habit.
The experience you had was with CFDT, given the timeframe of QC25…
I worked for Bose on the retail side from 03-07. The Wave Music System series 1 was released in 05. We had a display of the Wave taken apart on a spine showing each layer of its components. It looked like Jonny 5's head from Short Circuit. It was pretty cool. It was half an octave lower and has two individual 26-inch tapered waveguides, one for each speaker. It was a big improvement over the original. The original had two drives as well, but only one actually utilized the waveguide. It was a great company to work for because the company really appreciated you. You were not just an employee. Unfortunately, Dr. Bose passed away in 2013. He was the reason why I have a passion for audio engineering. RIP
Do you know if it's still a good place to work?
@RenaissanceEarCandy The retail side is long gone because Bose closed all of their stores. However, I do think it's still a great company to work for. There are different divisions within the company that are great.
@@arri275555 Awesome. Thanks for the quick reply
I was there, Gandalf. There in the 90s when you couldn't escape ads for this machine.
Ha! Me too. They were ubiquitous.
Every night there was at least one infomericial. It was up there with Ron Popeil for which I saw more.
And also Ads for the SOLOFLEX
I'm suddenly reminded of the Radio Times and the Innovations catalogue
@@jwmcq ah thanks for the memory jolt! I’d totally forgotten about that.
Wonder where that -tat- equipment ended up prob a combo of eBay, Etsy Ali express etc!
The "Got no highs, got no lows, must be Bose" saying goes back to the Bose 901 Direct/Reflecting speaker system in the '70s. The issue with the 901 is that it is VERY sensitive to where it is placed in the room. Set it on a bookshelf? Sounds like crap, hence the saying. However, if you followed the directions exactly (as in, very low Spousal Approval Factor), they sounded phenomenal.
Back in the early '90s, my mom bought a Bose Wave Radio. It was put on a corner shelf up near the ceiling in the kitchen. It had excellent sound, especially given its size. (The corner placement didn't hurt one bit...) Of course, an audio patch cord was run down behind the curtain so my brother could hook up his cassette player. A few years later, when the Wave Radio/CD was released, my mom bought one of those for the living room. She still has both, and they get daily use.
I worked with a guy that loved Bose - he had a set of the Bose 901 floor-standing speakers in his house. This was back when they developed the idea of 'whole-room stereo." He noticed that one of the 8 front drivers was blown on one side and called them up. They sent him a replacement in less than a week - the ENTIRE left 901 speaker assembly. They told him to keep the old one - not to worry about returning it unless he just needed to get rid of it. They had his info on the system and knew that he was a loyal customer , Bose didn't flinch over sending him that replacement. I thought it was pretty commendable!
The 8 drivers are supposed to face the back. He had them set up wrong :)
That's the scam. You make shitty, overpriced crap that breaks and make your money from all the people that DON'T bother to call the company.
@@Sashko_Dee When you use cheap paper drivers including paper cone tweeters, MDF boxes, and cheap crossovers, your margins are so high that you can afford to send out replacement parts and, apparently, entire speakers. It makes your customer service seem legendary. It's the opposite of a loss leader.
They use the Cheapest Chinese junk drivers, ever produced. In addition to them massively overcharging for this Junk... Its why they dont care at all, about sending some Cheap replacements.
I have a pair of EPI 100v speakers, made in the 70s. I also found a pair of foam rotted Bose speakers, in the thrift shop, for dirt cheap. My single EPI woofer, probably weights more than three of the Bose woofers. Why? Because EPI uses high quality woofers... capable of FAR more power, and far more Cone Control accuracy. They have Massive Magnets, for much faster acceleration + superior cone control.. which results in far less potentials for Micro-Distortions (which happens with cheap, low power, ECO-Speakers). They also have floor shaking Bass.. where as B0se woofers can only produce artificial sounding bass... with no actual physical "THUMP" at all.
Because bose has cheap crappy stuff, so they dont need to worry about replacement cost. Look into every hifi forum. They laugh about bose owners
I think the little story you told towards the end of your video, about your wife being so inspired by the sound that she went back to listen to her music library, sums it up.
She was hearing things on this device that renewed her interest in listening. That can't be a bad thing, and, is how the product should be judged.
A rather subjective issue at least, but, at best well demonstrated in the video. Bravo!!
I had the exact same experience with the Bluetooth function on my Vizio soundbar.
I was hearing things I had literally never heard before, different instruments, different ambience, it was a whole new experience...
I would highly recommend their "2.1" AiO soundbar. (2.1 in quotations because it has 2 subwoofers in the soundbar itself, making it a 2.2)
I am an older fella but I have been a Bose fan since they became available here in the northern Arkansas / southern Missouri area. We never had a store here in this hilly billy area but Best Buy carried many of their products and displays. I have purchased a couple sets of the QC 25 overear headphones and I was never happier. I can still buy the ear pad replacements on Amazon for a really reasonable price and I have replaced them several times. There is no way I could ever buy another pair as times are a lot rougher than they were back then so I am grateful the ones I have are still doing great 20 years later.
I appreciate this creator’s content and look forward to it each week. I wish the very best of health and happiness to you all and to your families!
You're a true gent Wesley. Love from London, England
Hiya fellow Arkansan. 👋 My mom has had a Bose cd wave radio since the late 90's and it's still going strong. Such rich, warm sound that's got great bass as well. Hope everything is going well up there in the Ozarks from down here in the delta region.
@@christopherangeli1141 Thank You for those kind words! That really brightened this morning up for me! It has been over forty years since I was last in your fair city and it was amazing. I wish you all the very best!
Hey Wesley, love the positivity and kind words. Greetings from Melbourne, Australia.
Funny enough, Wesley's original comment and Techmoan's video reminded me of the Bose store the used to exist in Osage Beach, MO in the early 2000s. It was at what is now the Osage Beach Outlet Marketplace. I remember going there in the summer of 2000 with my 1st wife, my cousin and his wife.
I think there also may have been a Bose store at the Tanger Outlets Branson back in the 2000s, although I'm not entirely sure. I used to frequently visit the Ozarks & Branson areas from the 80s up until the early 2010s as I had family that lived near Lebanon & Cassville, MO.
When my (audiophile) dad passed away, my mum sold all the hifi gear, which she couldn't operate, and bought one of these. She has been really pleased with it, and I think it's great too.
I love that Matt can make a 20+ minute video about a thing I don’t care about at all and it’s still a very enjoyable watch
Matt is one of them people that has such an engaging personality, and enthusiasm for what he's talking about, that he could make a video about a paving slab and it'd be interesting
and by the end I want to buy one :D
That's techmoan
@Valveus I'd watch that
Mans got a talent. Gotta give him that. I came here for vinyl collection and tips and advice and have subsequently learnt even more on top because of his enthusiasm and engaging nature. And opened and even deeper, larger, much more galactic black hole in my wallet….
They hawked these things _so hard_ here in the US in the 90s and 00s. You couldn't go a single commercial break in any show you were watching without an ad for one of these. They had hour long infomercials about them. You couldn't escape the Bose Wave. It was everywhere. And yet, I never saw one in person. But they had a sort of mythical quality around them.
I love that as we get older, NINE YEARS AGO starts to feel like "relatively recently"! lol
When I was using Windows XP in the early 00s, DOS felt like an ancient relic, now despite a much bigger gap XP still feels recent.
@@treelineresearch3387 While modern macs, win11, etc are a good bit different than windows XP, DOS is just on a whole other planet. :p
@@treelineresearch3387this is also due to technological progress slowing down. XP feels recent because it's the basis of modern Windows, while we went from 8bit microcomputers to Windows 95 in 10 years.
Also, DOS felt ancient because it was primitive and quite outdated even in its own time, already in 1985 the Amiga had a windows-like OS.
@@treelineresearch3387 same here pretty much. That is also kind of why I think of all the games, movies and anime made in this period and after it as rather recent
i consider anything after 2000 recent history and anything after 2010 recent..and after 2020 was like yesterday...
I’ve had a Bose Wave Radio/CD since 1997. Been in daily use ever since. Everything still works perfectly, including the vacuum fluorescent display and the laser for the CD player.
Can’t even remember what I paid for it.
Still sounds great and the alarm clock function wakes me up every day, playing greet sounding music. What a pleasure.
I miss shopping in physical stores. Half the time wouldn't even buy anything. Just run down to the local electronics store to wander around and see what cool stuff they have.
I live in a small town (less than 8,000) and I travel into Sydney often for work. It's actually incredibly boring to walk around now, all the shops are just overpriced clothes, nothing interesting.
Sydney is lovely and the sightseeing is fantastic but shopping everywhere is just shit.
Exactly! Shopping nowadays is so boring unless you are into clothes or fashion.
Absolutely! And large department stores used to have special room for high end sound systems.
Retailers love spending loads of money on stores so people can come in and not buy anything 😂
It's not even fun to meander around a target anymore. And we got secret shoppers too? Not worth it.
On the bright side, the aggressive and manipulative way advertising has become actually makes me spend way, way less money on anything
In the 90's, early 2000's, a lot of businesses (at least in California) used the Bose Wave players for background music, especially small businesses with waiting rooms.
We bought one for our grandmother. She absolutely loved it and is now playing music every time we stop by and see her. She loves the way it sounds and how easy it is to use. Love or hate Bose, they nailed this one.
I bought one over 10 years ago after hearing my uncle's. It is a great little radio. The most bass I've heard come out of such a small radio at kitchen listening levels.
I inherited my grandmas wave (from the late 90s) it still works and sounds fine.
Growing up in the early 2000s my grandparents had one of these bose units, not sure which one exactly. Whenever we drove out of the city to visit them for a few days i remember i'd wake up with the morning radio playing on the unit and my dad making pancakes for everyone. It's associated with a lot of good memories.
No blue tooth?
I remember seeing one of these at my (very wealthy) childhood friends house. I never heard it switched on but it had a really attractive design and I knew it was expensive. Years later I got a set of Bose Companion 5 PC speakers used. I remember reading reviews on how people said Bose was a terrible speaker company but the price was good so I bought it. I had a very similar experience when I first heard them. Amazed at the quality and clarity of the sound, also how incredibly loud you could put the volume with no distortion. I just sat for a few hours enjoying my music. People seem to be overly harsh on Bose because of their high prices but not everyone wants to build a whole Hi-Fi system. I like the way they sound.
You don't need a whole hifi system to beat Bose. Any real system will do, they are the worst sounding option.
Used/discount Bose is just fine. The issue was never that they sounded bad. The issue was the inflated cost.
@@bobbygetsbanned6049 I love my big floor-standers and mono-blocks, and I'd never buy a Bose system purely on cost/performance grounds, but saying they are the worst is just a big plate of under-cooked bollocks! Do you by any chance use felt tip pens to make your CD's sound better?
I think that it's because "audiophiles" love to tinker with their setup, which Bose doesn't really lend itself. Also
they are very aware of the components inside the hardware and Bose is notorious for their cheap paper drivers, which brought to the "overpriced crap" perspective.
I personally find their products sound good. Sure, they are heavily equalized by design, but it's a sound that was researched to please the majority of listeners.
No, people are harsh on Bose because the sound really isn't all that good. Most have never heard how a an actually good system sounds.
I had a roommate in college (early 2000s) that had gotten one of the basic Wave radio/CD players as a graduation present. It was perfect for an apartment, rich sound without overwhelming bass. Especially for being so compact. He was a musician and I constantly listened to music, so that thing got a lot of use.
I don't understand though. Surely there's a reason that bookshelf speakers or micro hi-fi speakers have wooden enclosures. Can the equally (or more) expensive BOSE Wave radio really produce the same or better sound out of a plastic boombox of sorts? 🤔
@@TassieLorenzo no one cares.
@@TassieLorenzodepends on the speaker. These are pretty nice. They were always more expensive than they should be, but they sounded awesome.
@@TassieLorenzono I don't think so, but boomboxes did tend to be larger and little micro systems of course were more complicated with more pieces.
I'm not a Bose fan although I remember an aunt or possibly Uncle having one of these Wave radios when I was growing up and it got a ton of use.
You got to remember sometimes having music in the home isn't always 100% about sound quality, sometimes it's about convenience. A lot of these Hi-Fi audio enthusiast, which I consider myself one, forget that.
That's what the Bose Wave radio did very well, you can plug it in you can put on the radio or a CD and it sounded good enough and you didn't have to think about anything and it just made listening to music not only enjoyable but also convenient.
@@TassieLorenzoWood (MDF really most of the time) is used because it's heavy, durable, cheap, don't vibrate and absorbs sound; if you use a good plastic, thick and rigid to avoid vibrations and with good sound deadening you can obtain good sound from it too.
And I'm not talking theoretically, I have a pair of JBL speakers made from plastic and relatively small that sound much better than you would expect.
This is like the most comforting channel on TH-cam. I look forward to your videos.
My father is probably the typical customer type for this product line - not an audiophile, just someone who wanted a high quality, unobtrusive radio with a pleasing design. He has one FM/AM model in his bedroom and one with the top loader cd in a small living room. Both radios are from the late 90s and have worked flawlessly ever since.
I got to know Bose back in college in the early 80s. Their small speakers (201s?) had incredible sound, especially for their size. They were perfect for me at a time when I moved often and lived in sometimes tiny places. I liked them so much that I later had no hesitation in buying a set of (wired, non-noise-cancelling) Bose headphones. Both of these Bose items stayed with me for decades, and I've only ever had a very positive attitude about this company.
I heard one of the first generation Bose waves when they first came out. My sister-in-law got one for just the reason they were sold: a small, easy to use, unobtrusive unit with excellent sound. I was blown away by the audio it put out. It was truly hard t believe. When I had heard she bought one, I thought she was crazy to spend the kind of money they cost. But then I actually heard it. Wow.
I still use a pair of 201s and 301s for rear channels on 7.1 system. The reflective sound is ideal for rear channels.
Back in 2001 I spent about 10x the cost of those awful (when new) cheap bedside clock radios on a Bose Wave CD/Radio/Clock. Considering I still dose off and wake to its lovely sound daily consider it a worthwhile spend. I mostly aux input phone but the CD player and radio still works fine. It does have control buttons on the top load CD player lid, a couple of them were a bit flaky for a few years, so just used the remote, but seem to have fixed themselves (maybe some contact resistance sorted itself out).
Also have a similar experience with QC Headphones, got them in the US in 2004 and when the side arm fractured in 2008 they were replaced without question by Bose NZ! Still use them, have once replaced the ear cushions as the foam degraded but otherwise still going strong.
I'm a millennial and I've always found Bose stuff to be pleasing to the eye, well put together, and with impressive sound. Plus expensive of course. I was also raised by a boomer GM automotive technician, so I associate Bose with Cadillac & Corvettes, etc. I was dumbfounded in the late 2000s to find the internet full of audiophiles saying Bose was trash. Yeah, the stuff is overpriced for what it is and the target market isn't sophisticated audiophiles -- it's plug and play general consumers. But I'm glad to see I'm not the only one that likes their stuff. Bose feels sleek and fancy in a way other products don't.
"Bose feels sleek and fancy in a way other products don't."
Ever used/seen any Bang & Olufsen equipment?😁
I’m one of those guys who was lucky enough to have worked in his chosen field(s) for most of his life. That multifaceted field is “Stuff You Watch And/Or Listen To”. The vast majority of Bose products were completely un-affordable to me for a very long time. I could buy ‘em NOW, but the Bose stores are gone, and there are other brands that have competed nicely with the entire Bose line, so I could never justify the “Over-Price” of anything that said Bose on it. However, when I heard the VERY small Bose “Companion II” computer speakers some years ago (we’re talking “late in the 20th Century” here - like, the 1990’s). They blew me away with the sound they made. I ended up buying 2 sets of ‘em! They have always worked fine, and each set has outlived several computers. Now, I’m going to take the oldest pair over to my little recording studio, so they can be the computer’s audio monitors there. They’re just the right size to fit under the computer’s two (video) monitors, if I turn the speakers on their sides. They should sound pretty amazing - and this pair is the older of the two! The very first TV Director I ever mixed audio for ended up (after we had worked together) as a Post-Production “Mucky-Muck” at CBS Television City in Hollywood. I was surprised to find, in a BIG room (about the size of a Supermarket, if memory serves) DOZENS of Broadcast-Quality video recorders (with each one set up to record News from every TV station in L.A., along with a number of satellite TV News sources, simultaneously) and each of these machines had its own pair of “Companion II’”s. I have no idea how many recorders and speaker-sets it added up to, but I’d never seen so many of these things, all in one room, in my life!
When I was a kid in the mid-80's my family bought one of the first generation Acoustic Wave systems (the ones in the big bag). It was INCREDIBLE at the time - in fact I was in marching band in high school and to practice our formation marching we recorded the band playing then played it back in the stadium - using ONLY my Acoustic Wave as it literally filled the ENTIRE STADIUM with sound. Truly a breakthrough product.
My Bose AM5 Acoustimass speakers from the early 90's are still on my wall right now belting out music and movies to this day. Bose may get shit from some but NOT from me.
Saw one on the Fresh Prince back in the day, and thought it was the coolest thing I'd ever seen - but sadly out of reach for a 13yo in the UK at the time! Glad it didn't disappoint.
lol. You must have awful hearing abilities, if you are praising b0se! I owned a Phillips Woox radio... and it totally Trashed the B0se radio, in every possible metric... and it probably cost less than a third of the way Overpriced B0se radio.
Maybe you should get your hearing checked. And or maybe actually go out and find some actual audiophile equipment to compare against. B0se isnt audiophile quality. They use the cheapest chinese drivers, that have ever been manufactured. They use some electronic methods, to make them sound "adequate".. and to help keep their low power woofers from distorting.
I was 14 when the early Acoustimass came out, and a wealthy friend of my father had a set. I loved them, but could never afford them. When I was 18 he bought a lifestyle 5, and I was amazed that he was able to buy an add-on amp and relocate the original speakers to his family room, and the remote worked through walls. It was so cool!
Fast forward 15 years and my teenage lust got the better of me. I bought a 2nd hand powered AM5 system and loved it.
Over the next 5-10 years I bought 3 more AM5s, and a lifestyle system. All 2nd hand, and for a budget price. I love them all.
Only problems I’ve had was needing to change the leaky capacitors in the lifestyle control unit to restore the display brightness, and replace a fuse on a powered sub.
One AM5 setup is mounted in my rolling tool cart in my garage. It’s 6’ high, 8’ long and 1.5’ deep. Sub down the bottom, a denon mini amp & cd unit to drive it, and the dual cubes in the corners. My mates think it sounds awesome, and so do I.
I love the AM5s. They’re good enough for me.
Amen brother I’m the exact same way, still have 96’ cinemate speakers on the wall and boy oh boy do they perform. Glad to see fellow BOSE enthusiasts in the comments 💙
I still have my acoustic wave system made in 1998. The CD player died so long ago I can't remember, but the radio and aux in still work perfectly. That thing has moved house more than ten times, it endured teenage house parties, has a cigarette burn across the top, had beer spilt all over it more times than enough... still sounds absolutely brilliant cranked up. I feel like that thing is part of my family at this point and I'd quite like to be buried with it.
this is how i feel about the bose my parents keep in the kitchen!! Lived through 5 kids, countless parties, christmases, new years eves.. summer dinners where we would eat outside and the bose would be cranking out a sound track over drinks and dining. Its really part of the family aha.
My mother’s Wave she bought off the TV infomercial is still going. Every Christmas, it’s front and center playing Christmas CDs.
i love my little bose wave! i inherited it from a family friend and it introduced me to so many fun things, like local college radio stations and the joy of spending too much money on cds. i've had it for around 6 years now and i can confidently say that this little box has completely changed the way i listen to music for the better. it holds a special place in my heart and i'm glad you had a good experience with it :)
Much of the attitudes towards Bose depends on when you first encountered their products. My first experience with them was early on, when they introduced the first generation of the 901 speaker in the late 1960s. To those of us "audiophiles" who were into accuracy, clarity, stereo imaging, etc., the 901 struck us as a total gimmick designed to fool the "less informed" customer that Bose had invented a magic speaker that was small in size but sounded huge. I think that's where a lot of the animus against the company began. Following the 901, they introduced the "sound cube" systems that had the tiny satellite speakers and a small subwoofer you were supposed to hide somewhere like under a couch. (They claimed to have invented this idea, but there were others who did it before them) Again, Bose claimed superb sound, but the reality was much different. They had to cross over to the sub at a much higher frequency because the little cubes had virtually no bass capability on their own. This created a giant bass "hole" and made the sub location very audible. So again, the audiophiles poo pooed these products as junk, which isn't to say they didn't sell well.....they did. The later lifestyle products like the the wave radios moved far outside the realm of audiophile interest, but the lngering suspicion of Bose "pulling a fast one" remained. That said, Bose was never geared towards that group in the first place, and for their target audience, their products were really quite well designed.
Used to have a Bose Acoustimass subwoofer and it seemed like it was not far off a foghorn tuned to 60hz, it could put out a lot of volume and power but no proper low-end at all and everything sounds like it's coming from a subwoofer instead of the bass blending it the other speakers. A lot like the subwoofers that come with cheap computer speakers but way louder (and heavier). Not like this is comparing with super expensive audiophile gear, vs a cheap 10" JVC or 8" Wharfedale home theatre sub of the same age that is about the same size and weight it's like a different kind of speaker.
Yes, audiophiles were also suspicious that they never provided the technical specifications (frequency range, distortion, etc) and used some dubious tricks in their listening rooms to make the Bose system sound better. The principle seemed to be to cheaply produce a sound the customer would like without worrying about accurate reproduction. A home comparison of those early Bose systems with a decent quality system of a similar price would show the difference. But Dr Bose himself was an excellent audio engineer, and I heard that he did some ground-breaking work on noise cancellation for the military (pilot comms). The company had some clever marketing though, and were constantly offering existing customers trade-ins on their old systems for new products to keep them in the Bose fold. I assume that these days their audio systems, particularly headphones, are now reasonably good quality & value, but it's hard for old-timers to shake off an early bad impression.
I have a Bose Wave Music System from 2005 with the CD changer that’s in need of a recap (the CD will no longer reliably read on the main unit or the changer). I also have the same system you are demonstrating on this video.
When I got the first Wave Music System the main unit wouldn’t play a CD without freezing up. I called the Bose customer service line and they sent out a new one that day before I had even sent the defective one back. They arranged for Fed Ex to pick up the defective one the next day at my house.
If their customer service is still like that it is second to none.
On the Soundtouch, if you ever change internet providers, it’s quite the pain to get it to switch to the new Wi-Fi. Just went through that a few days ago and after a few hours I finally got it back online and working.
They really are great little systems for what they are. Maybe a bit expensive but they can put out a lot of volume and sound pretty good. My wife can attest to that.
Bose designed a very funky active car suspension [Boss suspension YT ] into a Lexus LS400, it could predict when the front and rear wheels were going to contact a bump or obstacle and actually jump the car over it. Never went into production but ended up as seat in trucks/lorries and very comfortable. Look up the video, and watch a two ton car jump in the air. Thanks Matt
I saw a video on this a while ago and was kind of blown away. I didn't think about it until just now that a system that cancels out bumps is basically the exact same thing as noise cancelling.
They did get that product to market, for big rig seats.
As these were way out of my price range at the time, I looked around for something similar. I found the Creative Soundworks 740. Less than half the price, built like a tank and sounded amazing and went very loud. I bought another one for work in our warehouse and it sounded even better. As bluetooth speakers took off and streaming replaced CDs, I gave them both away. One to my friend's parents who are still using it 15 years later.
about 15 yrs ago i bought one of these Wave suckers, mine didnt have the CD player though, and no base unit, but i added a shark fin-looking thing that does the bluetooth connection. We moved into a new apt and while we were unboxing and putting stuff together people stopped by to say hello, and they heard this "little" radio that sounded amazing. I think about 6 people bought them in the building.
Now it sits in the bedroom and i use it all the time. I love Bose products.
@@RobertR3750 I guess, i still say it sounds great. Because we liked that Wave so much we bought the Bose TV sound system for the living room. It has two little speakers with stands for the side and one big sub and i think it's amazing. Looks cool too. When my iphone had a jack, i also had the Bose green headphones for exercise and they were amazing.
Bose customer service is amazing, they work on the serial number not receipt for warranty claims and they warranty the product and not the user. So as a 2nd owner, I got a free replacement when my unit failed, with no receipt of sale.
Having a background in professional audio, I mainly heard the "no highs, no lows, Bose" sentiment when talking about PA systems, because Bose PA systems are (were? - it's been a while) notorious for being optimized for speaking voice, and speaking voice only.
I remember being saddled with 802's and 302's back in the day for live use, with their silly little system controller that used to get red hot and fail... Hated Bose then and now! Overpriced junk IMO.
I think the sentiment came from their much earlier surround systems. Meanwhile, I have a set of Bose computer speakers and I got the opposite problem It's all Highs and all Lows. Not really complaining because that's what I mostly want from my video games anyways. It's a pretty impressive amount of bass for such small speakers, too.
Well, you can guess that the same 'optimization' is true of the Wave radio in this review. Vocals were "very clear". Where do vocals typically fall into? Midrange.
Back in the 80's, I went to an "amazing" Acoustimass demo. (I'm probably not spelling it right: this was the 5 cubes & a sub system.) They actually gave the demo disc as a free gift.
I played that demo disc at home on my meager system with bookshelf speakers (or, it might have been my own small stereo at the time -- nowhere near the price range of the Bose system.) Something didn't sound right when I played the 1812 Overture section from the demo CD.
I found my own CD with a performance of that: BOOM! --Real, dangerous bass, rattling the limits of my meager system, as it should.
The Bose demo CD, rather than being "full dynamic range", was actually TUNED to limit the bass in a strange way that sounded "great" on a Bose system, but sounded like thin garbage on any real system designed to play REAL audio signals at full range.
I 100% stand by the "No highs, no lows, must be Bose" statement. Because it's not a joke. Bose products are the poster children for 'Rip-offs'.
There was a stadium in the States that Bose convinced to let them do the sound for with their "clever" (ie, shedloads of teeny speakers all over the place). Within a year they ripped it all out and got JBL in.
I've always heard Bose as an acronym for "Boy Our Shit's Expensive"
My grandmother had a Wave radio, situated atop her TV cabinet, for many years. I have fond memories of listening to it with her. Come to think of it, she had a bit of an eye for good electroncis: that TV cabinet, for example, housed a widescreen Sony Trinitron. Anyway, I recall she'd promised me that when she passed away, she'd let me have the Wave, but much to my dismay, another family member beat me to it and sold it off. Oh well.
When I used to work estate sales, these were very common, and yet surprisingly popular. There was one guy who would turn up to nearly every sale I worked in search of Waves. Granted, I think he was reselling them, but still.
Don't feel bad for Bose. Like Garmin they pivoted to aviation and are making a mint convincing Cirrus owners that $1,200 is a deal for an ANR headset.
I haven't heard noise reduction headphones, whether for airline passengers or pilots, that sound better than Bose's.
I'll stick to my David Clarks.
I don't like Garmin because they bought out DeLorme GPS and took off the market the best GPS on the market. I still have it somewhere but forget exactly what it's called(Street Atlas) but you just have to plug the GPS antennae into a usb port on your laptop and install the driver and mapping software and data and turn your laptop into a big GPS. I bought it back around 2002-3 for ~$110.00 and it was worth every penny for an otr truck driver, far superior to any $700.00 model with a 7 inch screen. I still don't know if there's anything like it on the market.
@@classicforrealkicking it old school with the green
Watch series like Magnum PI and other older movies from the 70s and 80s: many/most pilots have Bose headphones. They made these much longer and didn’t switch there.
I don’t do a lot of commenting on TH-cam videos but I had to add my thoughts on this excellent review! I am a Bass guitar player of 50 years plus so I know what good bass sounds like. In my opinion Bose units of any type deliver excellent bass balanced with great mids and highs! The “no highs, no lows, must be Bose” cliche is repeated by many people who don’t have a clue about balanced sound from units that actually fit in to home spaces without dominating them.
I own many Bose units, from small blue tooth speakers to complete surround sound systems with dual sub woofer boxes and they all delight my ears!
If you are considering Bose, use your ears, not “influencers”!
And 10 out of 10 for this balanced TH-cam review!
So many ignorant remarks from people who've never heard current generation Bose first hand.
It has an amazingly balanced sound, with an outstanding layered bass, that you'll find only in more expensive speakers. And that's a shame. I wish that they would've continued manufacturing these wonderful devices.
I have two. One is the latest fourth generation, which is by far the superior one, with a wonderful layered bass and clear and powerful sound with superb mids. The second is a fifteen year old, that is recently showing its age and the CD stops playing after about 50 minutes.
I'll probably buy a used fourth generation, to replace the faulty one.
Highly recommended. It's a shame it's discontinued.
Well, as a fellow bass player of over 50 years' experience, I'm afraid I have to disagree. Yes of course, always use your ears; and if *you* like the "Bose sound" then that's great. But *my* ears tell me there's just something "wrong" about the way Bose kit sounds.
And personally, I always find it difficult to trust any claims from a company that refuses to publish specs.
I can remember infomercials for the Wave radio (here in the U.S.) back in the 90's. I always thought it looked like it would be amazing, but at the price they were offering I'd have to continue to wonder. One day in the 11th grade, 1996, my art teacher brought his in and had it going in the classroom one day. I remember even all these years later how blown away I was by the sound (compared at least to anything I'd heard in person to that point).
As a kid, I did think the Bose Wave was a overpriced Radio Alarm clock, only because I'd only ever seen them in magazine adverts, and never seen one in real life, and in the printed ads they looked a lot smaller, it wasn't until much later when I saw one I realised how big they were and that they looked like a higher quality product than they looked in the magazines ads.
The manual says to place the back of this unit within 2 feet of a wall. It produces plenty of bass. It won't make your ears bleed or thump your chest nor will it keep your neighbors awake during the wee hours, but you wouldn't expect that from a unit this size.
I always saw the adverts and wondered if they were decent, but it was way out of my league back then. Interesting to see your thoughts on it now.
Yeah, I thought the major complaint about BOSE products wasn't just that the audio quality was overrated, but that they were also VERY OVERPRICED?
@@StreetPreacherr That was my impression on the system when I bought mine at a thrift store for $40 (£30.47.) At the price I bought that radio for, it's the best sounding system I've ever owned at $40. However, at their retail price of $599.99 US (£699.00 retail price in UK), these systems are way too overpriced and I can understand the Bose hate on their price alone. Personally, I wouldn't spend more than $249 (£190) max on these systems.
@@StreetPreacherr Yes they suck and are over priced. Only their headphones maintained a pretty good reputation over the years, but they aren't cheap either.
I got mine mine at a yard sale for $10 is absolutely the best sounding clock radio I've ever had
I bought one just for fun and placed on a shelf in my shop and I have been working on something with volume on about 60% and more than once would just stop and listen to instruments I have never heard before in that particular song and the clarity in amazing…. It’s a series one !!! Loved your video …
We used to put those on display on big hollow wooden stands so they would sound more bassy and more people would buy them.
My PS5 does that trick too, since my cabinet happens to be a big hollow wooden box. Every time the disc is spinning it sounds as if a propeller plane is passing by.
@@kaisersoymilk6912 Dang, dude, lol! I'll bet your guests trip out on the sound the first time they hear it spin up lol.
Once again thanks for a snap back in time. I remember everything about these wave speakers. I went on to be an electronics tech in the US Navy and I maintained a high powered 3D RADAR. When going through training for that radar he brought in his BOSE waveguide to show us how radar waves traveled down a waveguide (it can handle tons of power vs a cable and no frequency issues). Anyway I fondly remember these Bose units and when I first saw one in a friends house I was pretty impressed.
I remember these used to be everywhere about a decade ago, nice to see you covering it. I would honestly consider getting one if they deprecated a bit more, but they're holding their value quite well on the used market.
My grandparents had one of older models for the CD playing ability. In fact, I think they still might. I haven't been to their house in a while though. And I remember thinking it looked cool as a kid.
@@Enchurito just watched a video that said differently, can't remembe where, hmm
My Nissan Qashqai Tekna has a Bose sound system and we have one of their older iPod docks in our bedroom for listening to music and they truly are amazing - beautiful, clear sound, and a deep bass. Absolutely amazing for someone who wants a small but powerful sound system for their bedroom or study - the ultimate middle-class simple sound system ;-) and worth every penny.
FYI the "highs lows"...thing is for the tiny Bose satellite speakers/sub combo. Those lacked high frequency from the sats, couldn't go low enough, then there was large gap between sub and speaket, and the sub didn't go that low either (and have a lot of distortion)
From my experience with several different versions of the satellite systems, that is not true. Not attempting to start an argument, just saying that unless you were attempting to duplicate an actual concert or maybe an IMax movie (both of which are painfully loud to my ears) was there any distortion. Bose usually has an active EQ rolling off frequencies and boosting others to combat distortion. Having said that, the satellite speaker systems where you provided the amp did have distortion issues because of the lack of an active EQ. My 901s (from the 70's) I used to own many years ago actually struggled to sound good at all, regardless of EQ/bass treble adjustments. Active EQ was necessary to "tune" an amplifier's output curves to match the speaker. I think that's why they used to push the optional amp/driver when you bought the 901s.
@@MrVolksbeetle it is true. Evidence to support it.
@@MrVolksbeetle The bose sats roll off around 14-16khz, reach down to about 200hz, and there is a massive gap between sat and bass module, then the sub doesn't reach that low. When I demoed one, it was all port noise and distortion. Absolute junk for the price. The only good thing is how wide and diffused the speakers were, but any bipole (which they are doing) would act the same, then you can get larger models with say 5" woofers to produce far cleaner midbass and bass from the cabinet. There was scientific paper done on the bose sats years ago. Also the driver inside the bose was really cheap about 50p. Thin plastic housing and no wadding.
@@johnsmith-i5j7i There is a difference between hearing and listening. I’ve found throughout the years that most folks don’t know the difference. Specs, driver size, cost and other such waffling on doesn’t really mean that much. I’ve demoed cheap, expensive, mediocre and world class. Everyone one of them have the same weakness: the space/room they’re going into.
It’s the same conundrum when shopping for a TV: does your house have 15-30’ ceilings? It is lit by 3 dozen (or more) fluorescent lights? Is your viewing room 12,000 sqft?
Warehouses and acoustic trickery can make or break a demo.
Most unlike any other audio company, Bose will let you audition any product to make sure where you listen is satisfactory to reproduce what you listen to with what they sell.
For the 1-3% of folks who listen with specs and paperwork, their products don’t cut the mustard. They’ll happily spend 3-10 times the amount on “audiophile” equipment.
The question is: who is getting the best experience?
Both is the answer.
Judging someone because they enjoy something based on your perspective of what does and doesn’t have value is a fools errand.
Ultimately, it doesn’t really matter. If you’re happy with your setup, and they’re happy with their setup, who cares?
I bought a secondhand Bose Wave AWRCC6 Music System AM/FM Radio CD Remote In Platinum White about 2 years ago. I also got the dab radio module and added a 3.5mm Bluetooth adapter. Sounds great and no issues. I am not missing WiFi which seems the only thing your newer model has. Thank you for an informative video Matt.
We actually did have one of these as our kitchen radio for years, starting back in the 90s...I think it might still be in my parents' kitchen after all these years.
Wow, I remember going to a demonstration of an early Bose wave back in the 90's. This was way before bluetooth was a thing. They literally had it behind a curtain and played some music. I was honestly really impressed by the sound and thought it was a setup with large speakers. Then they revealed it was a small device about the same size as any other portable audio device of the day. It also was incredibly expensive at the time. I'll never forget this experience.
Thank you for being honest. I love the idea of this as I wanted a radio and a cd to plug into my existing active speakers. I settled for a Majority Robinson 2 which is an amazing little radio screen without speakers and a Yamaha separate CD player.
A friend of mine bought one of these back in the day, and asked me to listen to it, since I was a recording engineer. I listened to some favorite songs and I know he expected me to say it was amazing, because of the "hype" (The hype was really just advertising, not so much word-of-mouth)
I said what I thought. The thing sounds amazing for a box sitting on your counter with maybe two inch drivers. It does not rival even decent speaker sets in the commercial range. It's nowhere as bright or refined or accurate as studio reference monitors, but it sounds really solid in the middle, which is awesome. It filled the room while being tiny. Good stuff! Then he asked the dreaded question: "Would you buy this for $750?"
I changed the subject.
Great video, I seem to remember the issue was that in the early 2000's they had a lot of competition from mini hi fi systems from Denon, Onkyo and Yamaha. All of these systems had the same functionality at a cheaper price and the sound quality of those systems was just as good as the Bose. Around that time I bought an Onkyo and it still works and has all of the features of the system Bose were selling in 2005.
I think the problem with Bose is not that their stuff is bad, it just tends to be quite pricey for what it is. Like with the headphones, you can get Sennheiser or Grado ones that sound just as good for less money. Even the Wave systems tended to be more expensive than a decent bookshelf setup. My grandma had one, I want to say bought in the late aughts. So some quick Waybackmachine, the base unit at the time was $459 Beaver Bucks, or about $664 today. That was with just the radio, no CD. If you wanted the CD player, like my gran had, it was $699 ($1,011 today). Where as you can buy a higher end Panasonic stereo 3-way bookshelf system, with CD, Bluetooth, and Airplay, right now for under $600 regular price. We did inherit the Bose Wave after my gran passed. It does indeed sound good for its size. But that's its only real advantage.
I think that these were maligned because of the price and they were also caught in the wake of Bose speakers. I've owned quite a lot of them myself and that's because my first speakers were Bose 201s that I got in 8th grade. They looked cool, they sounded better than a boom box, and because I didn't just shove them into opposite corners of the room like my parents did with their rack system speakers, I thought they sounded great. I bought 301s later, my parents got 201s and 101s eventually (the later plasticky ones), and I got a pair of 401s and some 6.2s used. I always thought the 401s looked so cool and I still do. I was just trapped in the ecosystem.
After getting a little annoyed with the direct/reflecting sound and speakers sounding out of phase after I became a bit more critical, I decided to try some used Paradigm Titans (not Titan Monitors, the older ones from Paradigm's less expensive line). I plopped them on top of my 401s and found that they did everyting better. These value-line speakers had more clarity, cleaner bass, and actually a wider but more define sound stage.
THAT is why people dislike Bose-- years and years of mediocre speakers that were surrounded by a veil of mystique and forbidding prices. Also, by this time, the cube speakers + acoustimass woofers were what Bose was most widely known for. Another speaker that made an impact in the show room, but once you really listened to music on them they were very middle-of-the-road. By the time these wave radios came out, people who were already critical of Bose were in a "Fool me once/fool me for 30 years" mindset. I was. I kind of still am.
We get these regularly at the thrift shop I volunteer at, and they move fast! Very high demand, and they go from the $75 or so up to $300 for the open box newest models
I bought a Bose wave in 2008. It’s still working ok in 2024.
The "no highs, no lows" comes from sound engineers faced with mixing live bands through the ubiquitous 802II model which a lot of mid range rental houses had bought many of. No tweeters, no subs, just 8 x 4.5 inch drivers per cabinet. They were loud and that's about all the good I have to say about them.
When I was interested in Home Audio, the catchphrase I would hear was, "Bose, better sound through advertising." based on their omnipresent advertising in every possible media. Their products were quite expensive as well.
Well, just guess WHO PAID FOR ALL THAT ADVERTISING!
I recently bought a late-gen Bose Wave Radio at a thrift store for, get this, $10 USD. The CD player was glitching, but literally just opening it up and moving the laser back and forth and putting it back together fixed it. The sound quality is ASTONISHINGLY good. Unbelievably powerful and balanced sound for the package. As much as I appreciate a cool vintage sound system like Marantz or Sansui, I'd say 99% of people would be perfectly served with one of these, and most of those people would experience a serious upgrade. Oh and it has an AUX IN, so consider it one gadget away from Bluetooth capable... :-)
A friend of mine has had one of these for over twenty years and uses it regularly, and I was amazed with the sound quality when I first heard it, considering the size of the unit itself. He admitted he was very skeptical about them when he saw the adverts, but after a demo in a Bose shop and the 30-day trial they were offering he took the plunge and was converted in about three hours.
My ex has a Soundlink Mini; those things are tiny; you could fit one in a cargo pants pocket, but the sound it puts out is you'd think there was a 4" driver in them.
My parents have had 2 or 3 since the 90's and still use them to this day. And in the same era when i was living in apartments, the Bose 3 piece speaker systems were convenient for packing and moving every few years. So while Bose may have been overpriced in terms of what audiophiles thought they should cost, they offered a good compromise for many people. Coincidentally, I only learned that the stores and much of their prior product lines had closed and been discontinued in the last couple of months. Timely and excellent video.
Around 20 years ago I bought the CD/radio player/clock as a bedside alarm. It was terrifically expensive, but top quality. I sent it back after the trial as I couldn't justify the cost. Then I spent a couple of months looking for another radio alarm clock, but none of them came near to being as good. What I especially liked was the automatic dimmer on the display so it didn't light up the whole bedroom in the middle of the night. Eventually I decided that the Bose was worth the money after all so I bought another one and I've been happily using it ever since. The one I have loads CDs in the top and has all the main buttons on the CD lid with a remote control having a useful subset of the functions. I've always been very pleased with it and I'm sad to learn that they've been discontinued.
The clock displays tend to be not quite so bright now, if they've been left on for most of 20 years. I wouldn't mind if I could find a replacement VFD display for my three but it is the basic nature of VFD displays that they are all bespoke.
@@8bitwiz_ Yep.
A couple thoughts I have had about these while spending countless hours at the Goodwill outlet. 1)When they were first introduced, they definitely sounded better than most comparable items that size. 2)They sure must have made these for a long time, because I have seen several similar but slightly different versions of the same device. 3) They must have sold more of these than I thought, because I commonly see these in the bins. 4) Bose sold people an exclusive experience, you could not purchase these at common retailers here in the USA back in the 80s. 5) They must be decently made because so many of the early models are still working today.
I’ve always liked Bose regardless of what “audiophiles” online would say. Same of Bose old speakers sound great. My mate still has an old Bose 301 pair for his record player corner and it sounds nice.
My dad was given one of these in the early 90s by his work, and it's great. We currently use it as a soundbar for our TV.
I remember seeing ads for these all the time, and being very skeptical of their claims. In any case, I'd never have paid that kind of money for something, especially back then. Pleased to know they did actually live up to the hype.
I worked for a company that helped market Bose Wave radios, back in the 1990s. I chose not to do that campaign. The folk who did got a free one. I wish I had done the campaign now! A pal from then I’m still in touch with still has his. It still works, and still sounds great. Great video.
As others have said, I remember seeing adverts for these things for _years._
I also remember they were out of my price range at the time...😊
My grandma listened to a classical music station out of Chicago on one of these in their breakfast room while she ate breakfast or did her cross-stitches. She passed in ‘21 but my grandpa still listens to that radio every day. It had a great big sound to my tiny kid-ears.
I’ve had one since 1995. Unlike every other piece of electronics from that time it still works. Perfectly.
I also have some from that time, but everything I own from 1995 still works fine .... all my tape decks, my mini-disc players, my CD players ..... even computers! All work fine from 1995 ... you know what doesn't work well? My electronics from 5 years ago. ALL recent tech is made to become obsolete in a few years.
@@AlTheEngineer lucky its 1995 and not a few years later. The capacitor plague has claimed a lot of my late 1990s/early 2000s devices :(
@@baseddoggie sure but caps are easy to replace! New tech gets killed when an online server goes offline..... Anything from the 90s is more maintainable than whatever we produce today. I have re-capped a few vintage computers and other devices... It's really not that hard!
@@AlTheEngineer im not denying that, it still sucks replacing caps. I have heaps of 80s stuff that still has perfectly fine caps and then you hit the early 2000s and they all have gone bad by now. It's just annoying
@@baseddoggie Sure, but even 80's caps will eventually die. that's just the nature of these micro-electronics. To me personally, as long as I can replace them, I'm happy with the product. When they make a product IMPOSSIBLE to repair, I simply don't buy it. So yeah late 90s early 2000s era caps were not the best, but they still lasted 20, 30+ years - I can't name a single modern device that will last that long.
I used to work a few doors down from the Bose store in Manchester's Trafford Centre. I walked past as they'd just opened one morning and they were playing an album at a fair volume, and i stopped to listen for about 10 minutes. Eventually their demo sold me on a CD i would never have thought of buying normally (Childish Gambino - Awaken, My Love!) I think audiophiles take issue with the "colouring" of the sound that comes from Bose's tuning etc. I get the theory on that but their kit really made that style of production shine.
Most people don't care about all the holy grail stuff that audiophiles do. Much like B&O i always saw Bose as a lifestyle brand over purist audio.
You didn't know the stores had closed, I didn't know they ever existed.
I remember one, visited it once when passing by, didn't last long as next time I went by it had turned into a cafe. 🤔🤔
Haha... Likewise 😂
There used to be a Bose store in the Opry Mills mall in Nashville, TN, USA. I don't remember it closed before the flood that closed the mall for a few years or if the flood was the end of it.
When the first Wave unit came out, Bose was trying to get people to be part of their in-home demonstration team. I went to a sales pitch at their store in their small theater. The sound was provided by a Sony Betamax with PWM adapter (about the only way you could do digital audio back then). The advert was impressive sound though their 901 speakers. Only, they weren't 901s. At the end, they opened up the speaker cabinets to show it was really a wave radio. The other thing, their research showed that people appreciate good audio, but a number (particularly women) were turned off by the complexity of stereos and particularly the stereo buying experience. That's why the wave was super simple to operate and why they wanted in-home demonstrators.
My grandpa got one in 2007 and gave me his 70s Pioneer. In the early 80s he saw records were going out of style and dubbed his collection to the format of the future, 8-Track.
please tell me he atleast kept his records lol
That 70's Pioneer is probably worth *money*. I hope you still have it.
@@TheJohn8765 Still have it, use it regularly. Unfortunately the power switch went out, so I've got to use a power strip to use it.
@@noah4822 the 45s yes, I ended up with most of them.
What a coincidence! I've never heared about this device before, and haven't been on vacation for over 10 years. It just so happened, that I finally went for one just 2 days after this video's release, and the accommodation had one of these. I was so thrilled when I noticed!!
Turns out that you were quite right. Such base from such a small device was a surprise, not being able to connect my phone without the addon however was less of a joy. Still, I can attest, that if you only have some small shallow rack space for sound, this baby can deliver way above what most would expect.
Thanks!
My mother bought a WAVE Radio on her own when I actually worked at a stereo store selling stereo equipment for a living. (I could have gotten her a discount on anything else she wanted - or, more likely, that I recommended to her!) I was a bit aghast when I found that out, but then I visited her one day and saw where she'd put it and listened to it and it was honestly the first time I realized that hey, you know, maybe there actually aren't absolutes in audio. She had it on her nightstand, she did use it as an alarm clock but she also just used it to have the radio on throughout her apartment. And she loved it. And I had to admit, it really sounded pretty good for what it was. It was definitely the best sounding clock radio I'd ever heard. That overall experience did start to change the way I thought about audio equipment. These systems do get too much hate; it's not deserved.
My first intro to Boss was the.commercials. You couldn't buy them in store only over the phone with a credit card, so my natural reaction was to think it was a scam. I was a bit surprised to find out later that they went mainstream and when I finally got to try one it was actually pretty good, as compared to my regular CD player.
I wasn't aware Bose even had stores.
I had a set of Bose Bookshelf speakers many years ago in my youth. They were the best speakers I've ever had! They had great bass but nothing earth shaking and the treble was loud and clear. Those speakers sound so much bigger than they actually are. They would be a great choice for people with a limited amount of space. I really miss my Bookshelf's, they were awesome!
I had known of the usual jokes made about Bose back in their days, but never looked into it, mostly because of the crazy prices they asked for even simple kitchen radios. Then recently I moved from a car with a Harman-Kardon audio system to one with a Bose system, and ohmygod how can 50+ years of audio engineering experience produce such a weak sound quality?! I feel like they've forgotten to put in the crossovers.. the subwoofer plays mids, the tweeters play mids, the door speakers try their very best to cover for the lack of the other ones.. yes it's loud and moderately clear, but it's far from "good" for an audio upgrade option that cost 1500$ to order.
Harman-Kardon are way more advanced. I have a subwoofer and speaker by them and Apple, it looks and su=sounds awesome still. Over 20 years old too
It all depends on the car. I would say the 90s through mid 2000s was the BOSE heyday for car audio, but only in cars that actually got a good system. Likewise, there were PLENTY of lame sounding H/K systems in car audio. IMO, BOSE was far superior to H/K during the heyday period I mentioned. I have assessed that post-2010, H/K has gotten a lot better.
@@christopherangeli1141 Unfortunately Harman-Kardon is commercialized junk these days too.
@@kevin9c1 Anything from GM with the "Bose" system was just licensed marketing, Bose had nothing to do with the cars sound at all except GM paid to use the name and they were all equally crap. H/K does the same thing now days...none of the speakers in your car are made by those companies as they would cost too much. You might get a $1.50 driver vs the regular $1.00 driver but it's not going to be "the real deal" any way you put it.
@@ZboeC5 That's a gross generalization and therefore not true. BOSE automotive did design and engineering work for car audio. Who makes the driver is like saying GM doesn't make the car, it's just a collection of suppliers. It doesn't add any information to the discussion to say that.
i have the original wave radio, still works to this day(20yrs)! i have a 3rd generation i gave to my wife for her birthday; because of their incredible sound quality I've used them for small party functions. Nothing like the sound quality & durability in such a small package. Truly end of an era as with the store closing...😔🙂
I was gifted a Bose SoundLink Mini bluetooth speaker about 10 years ago, and to this day, whenever I bring it somewhere to play music people are blown away by how big the sound is coming from a 2 x 8 inch box.
Still using my Sound Link Mini 2 daily since 2017!
same, try this and thank me later... when you go to bed, sit it above your head on your pillow faceing down towards your ears. sounds better than any speakeers headphones etc etc ive ever heard, its crazy.
haha, same here! last time this happened was this past Saturday in our yard "is that small thing playing the music?! that's quite a lot of bass"
Those Bose wave things are everywhere. My parents had one, both sets of grandparents do, I see them in so many houses
The old "No highs, no lows" description came from before these small systems existed. From what I remember, it originated about fifty years ago in response to their floor standing and bookshelf speakers lack of response.
1940s weak magnet speakers
What you’re hearing with the string instruments is the rosin on the bow interacting with the metal strings.
I was actually really impressed (listening through my TV!), because that’s how bowed instruments actually sound without any processing. They can indeed sound rather harsh.
I found that exact Bose Wave radio at a thrift store for $40 USD (£30.47.) As much as I love my radio, I feel like they're overpriced for $599 US (£699.00 retail price in UK.) I don't like that the radio does not have bass/treble adjustments or buttons on it. Other than that, I think it has a great for what it is, and I definitely got it at a steal for $40.
Had one of these wayyyy back when. It had a CD player on the top that popped open, no wifi or anything. LOVED it. Years later, ended up getting something called the Bose 1,2,3 or something like that. Was a setup that had 2 very small speakers that were to be placed on a shelf or wall on either side of your television. The third part, a crate-sized subwoofer that went on the side. The surround sound from that little thing was absolutely amazing & everyone who ever came over was sure to notice & mention it. I still have that 1,2,3 to this day! :)
Definitely miss the stores, we had a Wave Radio 3 and lost the remote to it during a move, walked into a Bose store and they gave us a new remote no questions asked.
I’m In Gilroy California. We’re a small community near the SF 🎉Bay and Monterey Bay, we had a Bose outlets here, opened in 1994. Closed in like 2006. They had a little theater inside with huge speakers. You watch/listen to like a 30 second clip then. Dramatically I might add, 2 employees got up to takeoff the fake speakers facade to reveal the little speakers. It was all quiet…. Well dramatic
I worked in retail back in the hey day of units like these from Bose and I can explain where some of the hate comes from:
* Bose required special sales training for employees to sell their gear.
* Bose required their gear to be set apart and not compared to any other equipment.
* Bose required you to only use their specially tuned and equalized CDs to demonstrate their units.
This meant "shoppers" could not get an accurate impression of Bose leading to disappointment in some when they got home or nose-high snobbishness in others.
I found that people who wanted Boss, only bought Bose. There was no convincing them otherwise.
I found that uninitiated customers heard our rule-breaking comparisons in sound rooms and never went with Bose once compared.
Me personally, I found that Bose charged a premium but used shoddy materials wherever they could get away with it.
* Paper cone woofers with untreated foam surrounds that disintegrated just after the warranty was out.
* Plastic cases where wood should have been used.
* Actual light bulbs inside their speakers to dampen wattage from external amplifiers. When the bulbs burned out, those channels were "blown".
This video, however, was an excellent review and makes the great point that this product was made for certain situations and people, and it does what it was built for extremely well.
Cheers!
Right I'm so confused, I endured many a sales pitch just to hear what their stuff actually sounded like, and suffice to say I was sufficiently less impressed than Mat is here. I guess this is a much newer version than the ones I heard, but based on my experience, I just can't imagine. Usually the people who love Bose haven't ever had real speakers, but he does, and I have no idea what's even going on anymore. Is this a part of the natural aging process, liking Bose eventually? I'm scared :P
Their marketing budget was unusually large, and they relentlessly touted themselves as high end.
I liked the way their in-ear headsets fit (with the little plastic hook). They were comfortable and if I fell asleep with them on they would still be in my ear when I woke up. The problem is the cable sheathing kept cracking and exposing the wires. Bose replace them once in-warranty, and gave me half-price two more times when they failed out-of-warranty. I finally gave up but if they had fixed the cable issue I would still be using them.
I absolutely love your set up. And having it all lit up and running is awesome. An old employer had a bose wave radio in the shop. It filled the entire shop, which held 7 vehicles and a spray booth, with sound. And talk about separation, in an area that size it was unbelievable.....this was in the mid-late 80"s.
I remember my first encounter with the Bose Wave was back in 1992. It blows my mind that they made this stereo as long as they did. It was impressive at the time. It was also quite expensive.
Had my bose wave since 2005. Still works fine.
Years ago, before I retired, I had to travel to teach a project management class in my company’s Cambridge, MA office. I stayed at the Charles Hotel since it was across the street from our office. Instead of the usual crappy clock/ radio next to the bed, this hotel had a white Bose Wave radio (no CD). I was impressed with the sound coming out of this small radio on my night table. Years later I used my Citibank points to get a later version in black with the CD player. I also bought a larger remote control with lighted buttons at the Bose store near my home. Unfortunately that remote is made with the easy grip plastic that gets sticky after awhile. I finally removed the coating with some solvent. Still sounds great after all these years.
I remember going to an audio show in the US back in about 2004. I was with a group of people and we were ushered into this private Bose room where up the front were these massive floor standing speakers. About 4ft in height. This lady talked about the audio system and then we were played a demo. It nearly blew my head off, the power of the sound was absolutely outstanding. It was jaw dropping. Then the lady flicked the front off the massive speakers. They were fake empty boxes, inside were 2 tiny square Acustimass speakers. At that point i was sold !.
@@RobertR3750 Hater's gonna hate
@@RobertR3750 This was just a makeshift room at a trade show. So the walls were just partitions at best.
Well done. These absolutely were good products. They were expensive but impressive. I've had several myself and gifted a few. I had two of the original small version that only came in white and had buttons on the top. The quality was impressive and holds up to this day. And I've also had a couple of the versions just before the one you have here. There is still one in my kitchen, it works well to this day and the sound quality is quite good. One of these is the perfect thing for an audiophile who wants good sound with their clock radio, or these were perfect for someone who might have a small apartment and simply does not need a full system. The sound quality is terrific.
The ads for these thimgs always made wonder if they were a gimmick, and lots of know-it-alls dumped on Bose. But to my ears Bose stuff always sounds great, though it's often too pricey.
@@avsystem3142 That sounds like audiophile snob hogwash. I want audio equipment that sounds good. Bose sounds good. End of story. Like I said, my only problem with them is they are usually too expensive for me personally.
I got my Bose Wave radio/CD maybe 25 years ago, still quite happy with it. It no longer functions as my alarm clock, playing the news as I get ready for work, as I have since retired and wake up when it pleases me. Today it lives on top of the refrigerator in my kitchen where I mostly use it as a radio and clock. I did buy a Bluetooth adapter for it years ago. That works well enough but I never use it.
When I want to really listen to sit down and music, a radio broadcast, or watch video I use the big component system in my living room. Honestly, I have been thinking of looking for a used Bose Wave for my little home office where I'm spending more time these days.
DAB is such an interesting, though terribly faulty radio standard. In Finland we had it from 1997 to 2005 when it was replaced with radio via internet streaming (and before anyone asks Finland has had unlimited internet data on 3G/4G/5G/6G(5G+) for 24 years).
Do any countries still push this?
(DVB-H was a similar nonsensical thing we had in Finland from 2004-2011, a digital tv broadcast to mobile phones. Yikes. I did have it on Nokia 7710 phone in 2004-2005, though.)
In EU passed a law that if you had an FM radio device it must also supports DAB. One of the result of this is that phones dropped FM support, instead of adding DAB. Thanks EU...
Car radio have DAB and I know no one that uses it, mostly don't even know what it is
@@luca6819 I remember EU passing that law. All radios have supported DAB/DAB+ for such a long time already though - and I don't see any country dropping FM.
Finland still has a 'dual' radio network - FM and internet radio. What comes to DAB, EU really didn't hear experts.
DAB is main means of radio transmission in the UK. Almost all new cars have DAB radios. FM is all but dead. Streaming radio hasn't really taken off as there are few Internet radios here.
Analogue network was removed for very nefarious reasons.
I went to a demonstration of the original Wave radio when it was first introduced (I guess not the original according to your timeline, but the little clock radio one). I was a subscriber to Popular Science magazine as a kid and I assume that's where they got my name because I got a postcard in the mail when I was about 12 or 13 inviting me to a demonstration of a thing with bose, so I got my dad to take me.
For the demonstration where they showed us a film and there were all these speaker boxes set up all over the place and the film had a lot of classical music and stuff in it. Near the end, some people came out and picked up each of the speaker boxes and held it up to show it was empty, and then finally picked up a box that was in the center, and lifted it up to reveal the little bose radio underneath.
So yeah it was definitely sold as a full HiFi system except in a little unit
I am a Bose basher for sure, but I never thought the QC25s were low quality, the Wave systems I've heard sound great, but they're all silly expensive. I'm happy to hear they back them up though. My main issue with them was their sound plates and acoustimass "home theater" system. They really were quite weedy. Also it seems lots of their stuff does break. But hey, if you want to spend hundreds on a clock radio, that's up to you. Glad it does sound nice.
What Bose was always good at was punching above their size. They were never the best, but they were best for the size for a long time. For people who think audio systems should be heard and not seen, that made Bose the best.