Bose Energy Efficient Series sound system to debut in Chevy Volt
By Donald Melanson 
posted February 11th 2009 3:23AM
posted February 11th 2009 3:23AM
posted February 11th 2009 3:23AM
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Too bad even 100% Bose sound is 50% their competitors sound.
200% more expensive
300% less power
500% more useless
no wonder y they need a bail out cuz their sound systems gonna fail out!!!
Too bad they don't put half the money they put into marketing into product development.
200% More Hype
Just what the Volt needs.
Exactly what bailout are you referring to? Or it that some ill-informed comment designed to make us all think you're on the pulse?
May I have a regular stock radio with my volt?? I think they sound better :P
BOSE = Buy Other Sound Equipment.
"Now how how do I get all this stuff out of the car .. "
Er... I think Bose sounds pretty good.
Guys, please go easy on him.
You know what, no, Bose does sound good. Their products are ridiculously overpriced, but I don't see "100% Bose Sound" as a negative.
As a side note: I don't know why Chevy would be doing anything to make this vehicle any more expensive than it absolutely has to be...
What do you have to compare to bose? Some 1985 chevy pickup stock stereo.
Bose makes a cheap paper speaker and relies on marketing to sell their product.
... compared to a clock radio?
You know as much as my grandmother does about what sounds good.
Bose products are made to look good and that's about it.
My 1985 Chevy Pickup's stock radio sounded GREAT thank you very much.
While I have to say Bose products are over priced I am not going to deny the fact that I am happy to see a better sound system than 99% of the crap they put in cars now a days.
Rather see Bose than a .05 cent complete package most cars get!
I had a chance to sample their wave radio in the Dream Hotel in NY NY, while working on the late show with david letterman. Now, I really was impressed that this much sound was coming out of such a small box. But you go slightly louder than quiet-to-moderate listening levels, its paper cones bottom out immediately. It is truly amazing what you can do with porting when you do not care at all about linearity, thus you kill everything out of the tuned frequency and you get MAD resonance (which is why its so loud for such a small speaker). Bose loves to tune their porting somewhere in the 60-100Hz range. Impressive for something so small, but you face it up against my smallest system, a Klipsch promedia 2.1, and the Klipsch at $130 COMPLETELY walks all over the $400 Bose wave radio.
I also have a theory why many older people prefer Bose, since they usually use paper cones to handle treble, its usually cut off at as low as 10,000Hz with a 6db/DEC drop off so it gives a much warmer sound to it that makes it similar to a vinyl record.
I absolutely hate bose, but they do know how to market a product.
Actually, they do make decent earbuds, then again, I would much prefer a set of shure's.
If I was Chevy... I'd have taken a different approach...
Like the others that have commented, and the MANY MANY more that will.... Bose is just plain.... average (for WAY more than average cost... sound Monster'ish?).
I know Lexus is in a different class of car production... but this is going to be some kind of flagship vehicle for Chevy... why not take a look at Mark Levinson like Lexus did, or some other hi-fi company to provide instead of Bose.
Guess they never will get it 'right'. ;)
Because while Mark Levinson actually makes quality products, it still is a rip off. I would gladly take Mark Levinson gear, but you wouldn't catch me paying for it. I have a hard enough time justifying my Bryston amps and B&W speakers, there is just a point where paying more is not going to gain you much quality and I already feel that I passed that.
60% more expensive.
I think it goes something like - No Highs? No Lows? Must be BOSE.
Bose: "Quality through marketing"
250% more logo.
Great, now when you want to upgrade from the stock paper cone speakers that BOSE provides, you'll have to entirely re-wire the audio system because of the fucked up proprietary amplifiers that are connected to them. I have an older model Nissan Maxima and the shit is more trouble than it's worth.
You can buy other sound equipment, but installing it is a whole other thing entirely...
Halleluiah Brother! Sing it from the mountain top - my hatred for Bose knows no bounds for the same reason as you. I'll be stuck with my Blows crap in my TL till the day I finally replace it.
I prefer 0% Bose sound.
It doesn't matter either way. By 2011 the Earth will be environentally screwed and Bose will be out of business. Volt sucks anyways...40 miles per charge? Please, I go further than that on my way to work.
That's why the Volt has a small 1.4l engine to keep the batteries loaded to extend the driving range with on one full tank to 400-500 miles.
Interesting to see that with Bose everybody is like.. overpriced, underpowered etc while some other manufacturers do exactly the same. Produce a product which looks nice and seriously hype it in a turtle neck and everybody buys it. Guess what, with Bose its no difference only the target market has even a few dimes extra spare for buying their products.
Eitherway I wonder how these percentages are figured out, producing a certain ammount of sound with less energy sounds rather interesting to me. Shame that the specs don´t go in details in how they actually do it.
The reason that they don't detail it out is because it is mostly marketing and not innovation. Bose mostly is overpriced for what you get, they do have a line of speakers that aren't all the bad, but I also wouldn't consider them great. There are many other speaker companies out there producing a better product for list, such as: Paradigm, PSB, Energy, Mirage, Monitor Audio, Axiom, B&W, KEF, Klipsch, SVS (I think they branched out from subs to speakers now) and NHT just to name a few.
It is just like Monster Cables and their overpriced crap. They used marketing to get to the masses, to get everyone buy quality cables. Which isn't bad in its own right, but the crap they peddle as quality through their marketing is.
"Interesting to see that with Bose everybody is like.. overpriced, underpowered etc while some other manufacturers do exactly the same. Produce a product which looks nice and seriously hype it in a turtle neck and everybody buys it."
*cough*Apple*cough*
I do not have high hopes for this system, and I would never buy any bose home audio. however, as far as stock car radios go bose can be quite good. I have a bose system in my cadillac and it is the best stock radio I have even had. My lincoln had a jbl system with sub that the bose blows away hands down. I also rode in a Jaguar once that I belive had a blaupunct system that was utter garbage worse then an '80s delco gm. Other then these cars most stock systems I have seen have pretty much sounded like a boombox built into the dash. So while I understand and appreciate the kneee jerk reaction to the name bose of thinking over priced - under performing, You should at least ride in my 1999 Cadillac sts before you decide that everything that comes out of the company is garbage.
@ Patrick
It must be Obvious-Day at Camp St00pid.
Thanks you for the lolz this morning sir.
Mh... yeah, while I can see your point, I think Apple does have it's good points, like ease of use. And they usually pack in a good printer for free when you buy a computer.
Perhaps Bose manages to built better sound into cars though, because there they actually have space for speakers. Bose are mostly crap because of the size of their speakers... other manufacturers would struggle as well when being restricted to these tiny cubes. Good sound quality requires big speakers.
NOW with even less bass than ever before!!
Actually I think you mean "Less mid-range frequencies than ever before".
Yeah, less real, deep bass. And less highs too.
You'd think the way technology is evolving Bose could figure out how to make their speakers not suck.
So have you heard these speakers yet or are you just talking out of your ass, repeating what all the other parrots in this thread are saying?
Yes, because ALL THE SUDDEN Bose will make a product that's actually worthy of the marketing hype.
Just like Monster's next cable really WILL give you a noticeable difference in your AV experience.
Because Bose is a marketing company, not a technology company.
Why is Chevy promoting the Volt so heavily 2 years before production? Its such a long wait that it ruins the excitement. They sure know how to take the fun out of a hyped up product.
They're desperate for sales, and a better company image, that's why.
They are desperate to improve their fuel efficient image so that they can keep their hand out in Washington. You can't fly personal jets everywhere, have a team of mechanics follow you when you actually do drive along with a tanker truck, design crappy cars and expect to stay in business - the solution if capitalism doesn’t work - convince Washington socialism is the answer.
I just bought the Companion series II for my Macbook, and I think they sound pretty good. Much better than the logitech shitness I hear see everywhere.
Wow. I've heard these Companion II, but good isn't a word I'd attribute to them. Loud, maybe. 100 Hz kick bass, maybe. Real, 20-50 Hz bass... nope. Those higher end Logitechs with subwoofer at least deliver that, more or less.
"You know what, no, Bose does sound good. Their products are ridiculously overpriced, but I don't see "100% Bose Sound" as a negative."
The biggest problem with Bose is that they spend an inordinate amount of effort to make sure that you never get to make a fair comparison between their stuff and anyone elses. They have their own in-store displays and their own custom soundtracks. They have a long history of stacking the deck against consumers. Because you can't compare, and because they are relentless marketers, it's not surprising that people think they're great.
Sadly, the stuff you're likely to run into at the big-box stores isn't much better. It's a damned shame because you don't have to spend a lot of money to get much better sound. There area lot of smaller manufacturers who make reasonably-priced speakers that are so much better than the big-name stuff. It makes a world of difference. Aperion Audio and NHT are a couple of good examples.
Unfortunately, car systems these days are so integrated that it's hard to upgrade. I have that problem in my current car. I love the car, but the sound system is Bose and, frankly, it's not very good. All the proprietary stuff (custom amps with custom EQ circuits) make it almost impossible to upgrade the individual speakers.
My background is in electronics and audio and at one point I worked for Bose in the department that creates the custom program material.
my local Fry's has a room set up to compare Bose vs other speakers. Of course when I first walked in there they only had Bose playing and I thought it sounded pretty good, then for fun switched over to the Polk speakers. No comparison, it was like comparing my tv's speakers to Martin Logans. When I switched back to the Bose I was then able to hear all the static and noise in them, garbage.
Thanks you Bose. But i will stick to my Made in America JL Audio amps, subs and comps.
BTW I am indian, living in Australia driving an American car who refuses to buy chinese
rubbish from Bose, who happens to be Indian too.
Seriously guys, if i was to get a Bose system, it would have cost me 4000 dollars and
after listening to some Mazdas and Alfas, my JL Audio setup blows it out of the water.
Cost me a few dollars more but it rocks.
uh, while Amar Bose himself is of indian descent, he was born in Philidelphia and the Bose headquarters is in Framingham, Massachusetts.
Most of the people that work there were from MIT (originally, I dont know how true that is anymore).