Speakers Reviews

Bose is a fascinating case study of what the power of advertising can do for products that are acknowledged within the audio industry as being cheaply made and technically outperformed by all of its competiters. Based on audio theories from the 1960's and parts of lower quality than what can be bought at Radio Shack, Bose has built an incredible empire out of poorly designed products driven by a huge advertising budget creating an aura of "Bose".

Consumers should do their research before shelling out money for Bose speakers. A google search will bring you to epinions or audioreview websites where you can find review after review, mostly negative, from buyers of Bose products.

The commonly accepted wisdom in the audio industry is that Bose makes low audio quality products and sells them at very high prices. In other words those Polk, JBL, Wharfedale or Infinity mid-fi products you can find at Amazon are usually higher quality at much better price points.

Compare the sound if you ever get a chance. Make sure you DO NOT depend on volume, in other words volume is a bad indicater of quality. Listen for the high and low notes and to the clarity of the music. Tough to do in a showroom at Circuit City or Best Buy, but even there the differences will show up. Bose attempts to prevent consumers from doing this by segregating their products away from the competition.

After this you might look at online audio magazines (do a google search), Audioreview (one word) and Audiogon. You'll find whole NEW world of audio products such as PSB, Paradigm, Vandersteen, Quad, Sonus Faber, ACI and many more who's products will put you on a much higher level of audio than you'd ever imagine. Usually these speakers are SEVERAL times more electronically sophisticated than Bose at the same price! What you won't find in these websites of magazines are Bose articles. Bose just isn't taken seriously by the industry.

Good luck and happy hunting!

Normally I stay away from reviews of products outside the realm of cds and books. Not this time!

If your idea of fun is waiting on a customer service line with the words "Please wait for the next available agent" ringing in your ears endlessly, only to find out - after missing several important business calls - that you are being required to spend additional money (120 bucks) to get your problem resolved, then go through Bose. Cd players getting stuck and static on the speakers is not how I used to enjoy music when listening to Pioneer equipment. And I spent less money with Pioneer.

This company (Bose) charges way too much money for original product purchases to justify the customer spending hours of his own time trying to fix a problem generated by lack of real ingenuity on the part of the company. In other words, they should build this stuff BETTER! One who can afford these products does not have time to re-enact choice product abuse scenes from movies like "Office Space" (i.e. in this case, hacking away at a cd magazine with an ice pick in order to try to remove it).

So if you do want hassles and a company website that does not empower you to directly contact anyone with any power in the organization, go through Bose.

They will not disappoint!

I strongly agree with the other reviewers that Bose's speakers are way over price. They are living off the hype of their success of the wave radio and their early surround sound system that were great theater quality. That is the only reason they have to justify over pricing their other not too hot products. I got these speakers 2-years ago and the price were still the same?

Performance/quality:
These speakers are very clear and you get a good range of sound. High pitch sound can be heard, but there are no bass sound what so ever. If you have a receiver, a sub-woofer is necessary or these speakers are too boring to listen to. I would say the sound is dry/flat, not very special, but again are very clear. These speakers are loudspeaker (I noticed they renamed them multi-purpose) meaning they belong in a church, mall or other civic spaces that doesn't need bass, but have some clarity. The surround sound effect is a gimmick, they sound like any other above average quality speakers. They are bigger size then normal satellite speakers. They do have hanging bracket that can be screw to the wall. Are not weather proof.

Price:
Why did I pay for overpriced speakers? I got gift certificate and needed to finish my rear satellites of my 5.1surround system. At Good Guys nothing was cheap and I heard of Bose before and the salesman said they were great (full of nonsense). At base price of $161 they are price at a low to average price tower speakers that will give you more bass. For being a supporting cast as the rear satellite, I think they should be priced under a hundred dollar. For multi-purpose or civic loudspeaker price should be no more then a hundred-twenty dollar for these guys. If you can find them on sale for under hundred they would be a great pick up, but otherwise past on these and Polk Audio, Klipsch are better price/performance.

I have a Siemens 2420 system with 8 handsets. I have sent several in for repair with not much improvement. The handsets constantly drop out in the middle of conversations. The noise in the earpiece is terrible and the person on the other end of the line cannot hear you. I emailed Siemens about this and they admitted that they had a problem with the handsets' shielding which caused the dropouts. I then asked if I could get some kind of credit towards their new model since I had spent a small fortune buying the base and all the handsets for teh 2420, but they would not do that. Why would I trust them with this new system when they will not support the old one. At least they should have redesigned the handsets so that we could use the system. I am stuck trying to decide what to replace my 2420 with. The one thing that the Siemens has going for it is the features. Unfortunately, if you cant use the phone, they are useless.

The phone looks decent enough, but performs miserably. I love the base unit (not enough cordless systems have a corded base unit).

1. The absolute worst thing about the phone is the sound quality. There is a constant clicking in the earpiece of all of the handsets. It's like you are holding a bowl of Rice Crispies up to your ear while trying to talk on the phone.
2. The range seems at least average. It works fine in the back yard 150-200 feet from the base. (Fine being a relative term, considering you still get the same snap, crackle, and pop).
3. The only redeeming quality is the speakerphone on the handset. You can hear well, and nobody on the other end seems to be able to tell you have them on speaker.
4. One of the most annoying things about the phone is the beep it makes to indicate low battery (or when you put it on the cradle to charge, see below). The beep is one of those sounds that you can't immediately tell where it is coming from, and while not very loud, seems to permiate walls better than most sound. This would not be too much of a problem, if the phone beeped once or twice to indicate low battery, but no, it beeps every 10 seconds or so until you put on the charger or until it dies. I can't even estimate how many nights I've had to get up out of bed and find the phone that was low on battery.
5. This may be unique to me, but one of the handsets or cradles that I had was not made right. When you put the handset in the cradle, it would lose contact with the charger and stop charging. It would then find it again and begin to charge (beeping each time it reestablished contact). It would do it very regularly, and I finally resorted to taping a piece of paper to the inside of the cradle to help the phone sit straight and not lose contact.

Absoloutely terrible phone. Get the Uniden. I did, and It's infinitely better. Even if it doesn't have a base unit with a corded phone.

I agree with the Philadelphia PA review below. This is a great phone system. The majority of the features are ready to work right out of the box. However, this is NOT a system for anyone challenged beyond very basic plug and play.

The phone menu's are, in my opinion, very easy to use. Most frequently used features are available from dedicated buttons on the base unit and the handsets. If you use a modern Nokia cell phone, you will have no problem using this phone.

The biggest complaints about this and other cordless phone systems have been range from base unit to handset. I was worried about this myself before buying the 8825 phone system due to the complaints contained in other reviews. However, I was very pleased to find that the phone works exceptionally well throughout my home (bathrooms, closets, attic, I mean EVERYWHERE) and is very satisfactory within 150 feet outside of my home. I have purchased an additional handset for my shop and it works very well. My home is typical suburban residential 2-story construction in the Southwest with masonry exterior, 2X4 interior/exterior walls, gypsum wallboard, tile floors and carpet. Nothing special from a materials point of view. The base unit is right next to my computer, which doesn't seem to affect range one way or the other. The absolute worst problem is a popping sound when the microwave is running and a handset is within 10 to 15 feet of the microwave, so keep that in mind if you plan to place a handset in the kitchen.

Sound quality is slightly less than a wired phone. But the convenience of cordless operation makes this a non-issue.

LCD displays are good contrast and easy to read.

The speaker phone feature on both the base unit and handset work very well. As with any speaker phone, you have to be careful with background noise (TV, Stereo, Children, etc.) or you will not get satisfactory results.

I would definitely make this purchase again.

Now for the nitpicks, because nothing is perfect:

I bought the basic package and two additional handsets. Everything was packed in a highly professional way. The phones were beautiful. "This is commercial quality, top of the line equipment", I said to myself. And then I unpacked these cheapo rechargable batteries that shipped with the unit. I got over it pretty quickly, but it made me feel uneasy for a few minutes.

The user interface style, options, and terminology are slightly different between the base unit and the handset. Not enough to cause confusion but enough to make you wonder if two different software engineering teams worked on the 8825 system.

The menu buttons on the handset work differently from anything I have ever seen before. Two short but wide buttons that you operate by pressing down on the left or right edge in order to navigate through the menus. They look like one button that you just press down on, but they are actually two-buttons-in-one that you rock to the right or left. Very strange. They are a little difficult to use of you have big fingers (like me) but they seem to get the job done.

I am an engineer that likes things done a certain way and this next nitpick really bugs me. The base unit has two buttons for controlling the base unit volume. These buttons are labeled '+' and '-'. The '+' key is on the left, and the '-' key is on the right. When you press the '+' key, the base unit LCD display confirms that the volume is increasing by growing a bar graph on the display towards the right. When you press the '-' key, the base unit LCD confirms that the volume is decreasing by shrinking a bar graph on the display towards the left. This is backwards and very awkward when you look at the screen. If you are "user interface design" inclined, this will make you grind your teeth loud enough to garner concerned looks from your significant other.

The handset instructions don't mention anything about what looks to be a belt clip included in the package. At least I think it's a belt clip.

These are just nitpicks. They should not discourage you from purchasing what I believe is a well designed and very well built high-end home office or family phone system.

I own 2 other Apex DVD players. They are great. This Home Theater System isn't. The remote enters the number 4 repeatedly when it's just sitting on the table. It has gone through 4 sets of batteries in 2 months. The main unit doesn't recognize commands from it 3/4 of the time. It won't play SVCD discs as it's manual says it will. Overall, I'd say it's a piece of garbage. I don't know what happened to the good quality for a low price Apex used to deliver, but this sure isn't it!

My roommate and I bought this item and found out that it doesn't support VCD. How can a home theater product in the year 2003 not support the most popular form of video entertainment. This is just garbage.

We bought the HT-100W last Thanksgiving. This was our first experience with home theater. The price was great and we were very happy with its performance, for the most part. It could have been louder, but that was usually not a problem. Unfortunately, it died about 10 months after we bought it. I am thinking that in the future, I will keep away from integrated DVD players.

I was looking for speakers that i did not need an a/c adaptor for so that I could let other people hear my music and listen to it without being connected to the player by wires.<br /> <br /> the pros:<br /> -cheap<br /> -very portable<br /> <br /> the cons:<br /> -too cheap<br /> -volume roughly reaches voice level<br /> -no bass (but what did you expect)<br /> -poor sound quality (a didn't expect great sound quality, but no matter what volume i play at the sound has an echo sound like it's coming from within a tube or down a tunnel.<br /> <br /> I opened them with a little hesitation thinking I'd only lose $10, but the minute i heard sound come from them i realized that was a quick $10 to drop. I wasn't looking for good speakers, but but i was hoping for passable ones.

DONT BY THESE SPEAKERS!!! I repeat DONT BY THESE SPEAKERS!!! They are passive which means they do not amplify the sound. They say good for walkmans, but you cant here them. Sound quality is OK. NO BASS! I bought these and I can hardly hear them when my walkman is on full power. This also waists ALOT of battery power. I conclude DONT BY THESE SPEAKERS!!!

I paid $11 for my set, thinking they might help free up some space on my computer desk - my old speakers were huge blocks, though similarly priced at $15, and I had started noticing considerable loss in quality after 5+ years of use.

However, it was evident moments after I had them running that they weren't cut out for any sort of "power" use. These things are definitely CAPABLE of good sound quality, but if you try to make them loud, they'll get distorted very quickly.

However, I'm not sure this is the fault of the speakers themselves so much as the quality of the input. I'm going to try getting a small amp and seeing what happens then. But as-is, don't expect any miracles.

dont buy this, it's a cheap product at low price for who dont apreciate the good sound of music.

I bought this sub on the "good deal" of an Amazon Gold Box offer. I've been disappointed since. Like other reviewers have noted, this sub's flatulence is frustrating and only gets worse over time. The comedy for me is that I proceeded too carefully in solving the problem. When I first noticed the problem I began talking to others with more experience. In talking to them, they convinced me I had some signal noise introduced. So I bought a power filter. Didn't fix the problem. I also toyed with other cables as well. By the time I figured I'd been had, I'd been had. It was too late to return the system. Also, unlike the others, my experience is that the sub will perform it's whoopie cushion impersonations in the middle of the most dramatic moments while watching movies (so not just when your audio system isn't in use). When you see a trend, take note and stay away from this poor manored component.

I have found this sub-woofer to be a compliment to some very old but dear Magneplanar speakers.

I ordered a subone online and it arrived with a terrible 60cycle hum. I exchanged it, and the second one had very audible distortion/resonance from the speaker surround at most frequencies. NHT said it needed to be replaced, so I got my money back, and bought the Sunfire True Junior -- a really good sub at the same price. I also bought the True from a local high end dealer where I did not have to worry about arguing about returns and Fedex pickups.

I ordered this subwoofer a couple of weeks ago out of a catalog and it shipped to my house in a couple of days.I got it out and plugged it in to my 300 watt sony stereo and it didnt work.I got an exchange fo a new one plugged it in, it worked fine, untill the next day when it blew. I got my money back and ordered the Sony SA-W305 which I still have. Its the best.

Simply NHT - one of the best out there! Just like the 2.5i - one listen and you can tell the difference!

i think the seller of this product should specify that they carry two different colors of this item and not have their customers guessing what they get. the point is i didnt get what was promised to me for my money and that to me means that i got ripped off by these people and i wish i could contact them and get my money back this was my first online buy and i got jipped so i think from now on ill get my lazy but off the couch and go to the retail store near me.

I have an old pair of Kenyo's that I paid $12.00 for and they sound better than these!!! Find something else if you enjoy listening to music. $90.00 for these $10.00 speakers is a rip off.

I wanted something to improve the sound quality of music played off of my laptop and so I started searching for some 2.1 speakers. Found these on a great bargain at xpbargains.com from Office Depot.

I have them set up in our TV "room" where they sit on either side of the TV and about 5 ft. from the computer. It is a great set up. Gives listening to music from the computer a stereo feel. One thing that would make it better is if the cords between the sub and the computer input were longer. It is just a 6 ft. cord and so I can't really stretch it much further.

These are not THX certified and the satellite speakers are pretty small so the sound is okay, not great. But it can fill our large studio appartment, no problem.

If the price is right, and it was for me (though 78 from Amazon seems little high) I recommend these whole heartedly. They take your computer to a whole new level.

If you buy these speakers, you'll hate yourself. Terrible quality! The subwoofer totally overpowers the other tiny little do-nothing speakers - and there's no way to turn it down. Spend a little more and get something good.

These beauties sound good. They really do. The bass is good, and the highs are high. It has a handy volume knob on the right speaker, along with on/off button and LED. There is no better sounding speaker for the money. With that said, there are some quirks to these babies. 1) they are not shielded, and you must find some signal 'sweet spot' to get that annoying low buzzing to subside 2) too many cords! it's cord crazy with power, plug in, and cord going everywhich way.

Buy these for solid, good sounding PC speakers that won't even break the budget. $20 bucks come on!!

This is no doubt a great deal for the money (I but mine used in December of 2003 on an auction site for $200 total), and like many have said here, it "kicks butt." It sounded great for awhile, but it has a known flaw that can't be repaired. I'm guessing that for all owners, the subwoofer will go out, and the part that will go bad cannot be replaced (the S64AMI power module). This part of the subwoofer is under a one year warranty. Anyone doubting this flaw has not done their homework, and/or has yet to have their subwoofer burn up. I emailed JBL tech support with my story and that my future with JBL was in question. I got a pleasant reply that basically agreed with my assessment (that it was a faulty design and can't be repaired) and said if it was under warranty or within 6 months or so of warranty, I'd get a free replacement. The replacement is the JBL E250P, which looks like basically the same unit. The respondent claimed that the updated design was more reliable and more repairable (none of these rare, expensive proprietary parts like the S64AMI).

He also said that if it was not under warranty, I could buy this newer subwoofer for $211.77 ($188 + $23.77 shipping), which lists at over $400. After scouring ebay and the internet for equivalent deals, the best I could find was a similar Harmon Kardon (but only 150W vs. 250W for about $200 shipped...and HK owns JBL), or this replacement JBL for about $260 shipped. So, as a cheapskate, I actually opted to go back into the fire and try JBL again for the $212. Considering I bought my PB12 used for $200 on audiogon.com and that with the new one, I'll have a fresh warranty, it still seemed like the best deal. If I'm made a fool (further), I'll let you all know. Look for my review of the JBL E250P I will soon be receiving...

This sub worked phenomenally for a few months... but I noticed a couple months ago that the mighty bass has been brought down to nothing more than a whisper- it powers on and detects the input (which is apparently a step better than everyone else who's bought it), but the sub barely fires- i have to actually TOUCH the driver to make sure its working. irritating.

I bought this sub about 3 years ago from Best Buy. I have had no problems at all. I have an entire JBL 5.1 system and the only weak link is my Sony Reciever(overheating). I have put this sub though MAJOR ABUSE. I can say that i have yet to kill this sub. I love the DEEP BASS this thing puts out. Makes movies worth watching because its better watching them on DVD then in the theater. I confess that I am also a Bass Freak.

I'm building a system from scratch, and I'm on a budget. I got these speakers because I just need something simple for sound. I tried them out on a system that I have already. With these plugged in and the computer on, even if the computer is not in use, they randomly make a loud static sound (sounds just like someone is messing with the speaker plug where it goes into the computer). I checked all connections, disconnected and reconnected several times, to no avail. I also noticed that they sometimes caused distortion on my computer monitor - the monitor worked flawlessly both before having these speakers, and after getting rid of them. I would recommend not having ANY speakers before I recommend buying these.

I purchased these speakers for a new computer I was building for someone on a tight budget. When I got them home and tried them out, they were awful. If I turned the volume up at all, they distorted like crazy. I turned the volume level down on the computer sound mixer, but that didn't alleviate the problem. I played all kinds of music on them (from classical to rock), but the deciding factor that these speakers were awful was when I was playing James Taylor at a moderate volume level and they were still distorting badly. I immediately boxed them back up and took them back to the store and exchanged them for Cyber Acoustics' CA-3000 2.1 speakers (two satellites and a subwoofer). I highly recommend you spend the extra ten dollars on the CA-3000's and don't bother wasting your time on these speakers. If you really want only the two speakers, try any one of the Labtec Spin 50, 60, 70, or 75 speakers and you'll get better speakers in this price range. These may have just been a bad pair, but I highly doubt it. I may be a bit of an audiophile, but, whatever the price, I cannot justify purchasing speakers that are constantly distorting.

... no matter what you pay, these are cheap-sounding speakers. No bass sound whatsoever, even after tweaking my sound card settings. They sound basically like what comes in a cheap radio.

My coworker's PC has a pair of JBL Pro speakers on her PC; maybe I got spoiled listening to her speakers, but it's amazing how thin the Cyber Acoustics speakers sound compared to the JBL. I'm going to return these. Since I'm not going to be happy with "cheap" speakers I decided to pay a little more and get a different brand of speakers that are slightly higher priced (and better reviewed).

One good thing I can say, is there doesn't seem to be much distortion with the Cyber Acoustics. Also the headphone jack on the front is convenient. And as other reviews of C.A. speakers have pointed out, the blue light on the front IS cool!