Bose alternatives
Discussion
Following an errant spot of lightning I have reluctantly been trying to fix the amp from a Bose Acoustimass 25 system. I have always detested the thing with gusto, and it is sadly proving rather difficult to find/replace the chips that have had their tops blown off, so wonder if there is an alternative that would do the job.
The requirements are:
- Satellite speaker-type system (i.e. sub + small speakers)
- 5.1 optional
- Inclusive amp preferred
- Inclusive DVD player not a bad thing
- High quality not required (but not so sh*t that you rely 100% on marketing to muppets with more money than sense)
- Up to £500ish
- Woman-friendly looks / operation
I think that's all. There's also a massive, woman-unfriendly AV amp spare that could be used with a bit of persuasion. It's not for me btw, just trying to fix the b
d as a favour. If there's nothing suitable that's going to improve matters a replacement Bose amp/sub unit can be had for under £100 on Ebay. Don't know if any of the Yamaha/Sony/Denon/etc. brands do anything appropriate, my limited research has not yielded anything useful as yet so any recommendations are welcome.
The requirements are:
- Satellite speaker-type system (i.e. sub + small speakers)
- 5.1 optional
- Inclusive amp preferred
- Inclusive DVD player not a bad thing
- High quality not required (but not so sh*t that you rely 100% on marketing to muppets with more money than sense)
- Up to £500ish
- Woman-friendly looks / operation
I think that's all. There's also a massive, woman-unfriendly AV amp spare that could be used with a bit of persuasion. It's not for me btw, just trying to fix the b
d as a favour. If there's nothing suitable that's going to improve matters a replacement Bose amp/sub unit can be had for under £100 on Ebay. Don't know if any of the Yamaha/Sony/Denon/etc. brands do anything appropriate, my limited research has not yielded anything useful as yet so any recommendations are welcome.I can't help say it, but when you say that you don't want a system that is marketed to muppets with more money than sense, that's the general opinion of Bose stuff. It's marketed well but isn't as good as the competition for the same price.
If there's already an AV amp around, I'd say they'd be better off getting some secondhand speakers and using those instead. For £500 you should be able to find a speaker set, try avforums classifieds.
If there's already an AV amp around, I'd say they'd be better off getting some secondhand speakers and using those instead. For £500 you should be able to find a speaker set, try avforums classifieds.
Latest Bose systems are flawed either by some technical thing they forgot about or just by the price. Only Bose can make a system that isnt compatible with the country's largest pay TV satellite boxes then say 'well it only affects 2 countries' so wont make a fix. There are plenty of sound bars out there even with wireless sub's that fill the simple sound required category, for 5.1 there seems to be less and less but most manufacturers do a 5.1 Blu-Ray cinima kit for less than £500 that sound ok.
headcase said:
Latest Bose systems are flawed either by some technical thing they forgot about or just by the price. Only Bose can make a system that isnt compatible with the country's largest pay TV satellite boxes then say 'well it only affects 2 countries' so wont make a fix. There are plenty of sound bars out there even with wireless sub's that fill the simple sound required category, for 5.1 there seems to be less and less but most manufacturers do a 5.1 Blu-Ray cinima kit for less than £500 that sound ok.
Which system isn't compatible?Its rubbish. It doesnt take the digital lead from a sky box because it takes the sound over hdmi and does its own upscaling to 5.1. The benefit from a user point of view being that absolute everything that goes through it sounds amazing regardless of whether the program you are watching was recorded in 5.1. I was sceptical but wont be going back to seperates thats for sure. The other big plus for me is that all mtv channels sound great and i control my entire setup from one bose remote. Theres a number of other "haters" that will also whine about lack of 3d but this was fixed with a software upgrade some months ago. Its just a master of all things and i can see it being in my household for some years to come. I upgraded from sony av and jamo speakers...never got it to sound as full as the bose.
If your amp only takes sound over HDMI, then a signal from a $ky box would only be available as stereo; even if the program is broadcast in true 5.1. This is because of a quirk with $ky boxes that only output 5.1 via their optical (coaxial?) output connection. Whilst many AV amps can do a good job 'creating' a 5.1 (or even 7.1 in the case of ProLogic IIx) sound, it's usually not as good as a true 5.1 source, which in this case sounds like you'd be throwing this option away. Note that if you have a $ky box connected using the optical output to another amp without this issue, you would get true 5.1 where available and other TV programs would be 'converted' into 5.1 (or 7.1) by the amp's processing, so the best of both worlds.
I'm not arguing for or against Bose per se, just pointing out why not using a true 5.1 source wouldn't be as good.
The post further up that mentioned the fixed price repair of £79 sounds like it could be a good option though as you wouldn't get a very good replacement for that price.
I'm not arguing for or against Bose per se, just pointing out why not using a true 5.1 source wouldn't be as good.
The post further up that mentioned the fixed price repair of £79 sounds like it could be a good option though as you wouldn't get a very good replacement for that price.
If your amp only takes sound over HDMI, then a signal from a $ky box would only be available as stereo; even if the program is broadcast in true 5.1. This is because of a quirk with $ky boxes that only output 5.1 via their optical (coaxial?) output connection. Whilst many AV amps can do a good job 'creating' a 5.1 (or even 7.1 in the case of ProLogic IIx) sound, it's usually not as good as a true 5.1 source, which in this case sounds like you'd be throwing this option away. Note that if you have a $ky box connected using the optical output to another amp without this issue, you would get true 5.1 where available and other TV programs would be 'converted' into 5.1 (or 7.1) by the amp's processing, so the best of both worlds.
I'm not arguing for or against Bose per se, just pointing out why not using a true 5.1 source wouldn't be as good.
The post further up that mentioned the fixed price repair of £79 sounds like it could be a good option though as you wouldn't get a very good replacement for that price.
I'm not arguing for or against Bose per se, just pointing out why not using a true 5.1 source wouldn't be as good.
The post further up that mentioned the fixed price repair of £79 sounds like it could be a good option though as you wouldn't get a very good replacement for that price.
Edited by OldSkoolRS on Friday 23 December 12:30
I understand that and your best of both worlds is actually the thing that used to irritate me the most with my old system. I was constantly changing the volume or adjusting sound modes just to hear the channel because the variation is so great between them and made worse when you go from an old program to an hd one. What a faff i am happy to be without now. Love the bose for its simplicity but i can appreciate it might not give everyone the technical gubbins they crave nor the source for many how to presentations to the wider family 
Yes I sometimes find that BBC HD broadcasts in 5.1 are louder than SD channels that are only stereo (Humax Freevew HD PVR). I actually like the more dynamic sound range of 5.1, but it helps that I don't have direct neighbours to worry about...speech is audible, but explosions are (naturally) louder. 
E31Shrew said:
Which system isn't compatible?
Its already been covered above, basically all the new lifestyles systems. The big selling point of them is this new all singing all dancing Unify system that is in all fairness good. So if you unify everything so it all works from the bose handset then you have a nice system until you discover that the sky sound is indeed 2 channel. The only way around this is to remove the sky box from the unify settings then re connect it so the Sky HDMI goes directly to the TV and run an optical to the Bose and set it as a No Video input therefore bypassing the unify system and the whole reason you bought it.Another little quirk I noticed is that it dosent turn on the other sources automatically when you select them but worse than that there is only a 'software' on/off control for the external devices which is one level down in the OSD, the next bug that does my scone in is if you select TV as a source, you then get a message on screen telling you to select the TV input yourself! Why on earth dosent it do it via CEC? They are just a few off the top of my head. Im not just an internet hater of Bose im one of the few people who has alot of experience of them so have good reason to not think they are worth the money they ask for them.
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