Bose has lows? Considering my system delivers 16hz very well, though you can't hear but surely feel it.
On the lifestyle system 35hz was was barely achievable.
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An Apple Savvy Move-Buy Bose
- Thread starter mpspence1988
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Bose has lows? Considering my system delivers 16hz very well, though you can't hear but surely feel it.
On the lifestyle system 35hz was was barely achievable.
Might be true of a lot of American gear but there's some great companies still out there like B&W, Stirling (who make the BBC monitor LS3/5a v2) even some great American hifi companies like Cary audio.
Right, but the point is a speaker maker can be very, very popular for a long time, then in an instant, be out of business. Acoustic Research is a great example of how quickly a speaker company can fail. During the 1960s they were dominant in their field. They didn't fall out of favor because they suddenly started making bad speakers, or because everyone else suddenly started making better speakers. Tastes changed, and AR had a sound that wasn't as current. It's a fashion industry to a large extent.
That's because Bose's signature flappy tubby fart hole technology is tuned at 50Hz.
And that's the reason I stay away from anything with ports or passive radiators.
I will say one thing about BOSE. They do make better speakers than Logitech. I seriously took apart a Logitech 8" sub, and as it turned out it wasn't a 8" sub. It was a piece of cardboard with a foam surround, with a black sticker on it. Behind the cardboard, there was a tiny little 4" driver, and what looked like a toilet paper tube for a port. I damn near **** myself.
I think you bring up a very good point.
Audio companies have always been strange to me because there's so many small players in the high end. It's nothing like television sets or even computers. There's dozens of companies that get by selling a run of 100 or less of their flagship products. It makes it really difficult to even keep track of things, much less compare and contrast (which might explain why there's a small army of websites and a fleet of magazines dedicated to helping people do just that).
I can't think of another industry that's quite the same way, where you can look at something like a headphone and find it for as little as a dollar or as much as $1,500. 1,500 is a pretty large multiplier for any product, low-end to high. Watches, maybe?
Audiophiles can get themselves pretty lathered up about this stuff. Why? Because so much what makes for quality sound is subjective, especially where speakers are concerned. That's why I have to laugh whenever I hear someone disparage a speaker maker. They must be making speakers that sound good to someone, or they would not be in business. Next year, who knows? I'll credit Bose with one thing though -- they have survived where others have not. So they must be doing something right.
I'll agree with your statements... to a point. But the concept of "tastes" is largely a product of people who don't have any idea what the "real thing" sounds like. For example, most non-musicians and casual listeners tend to think speakers equalized with a "smile curve" sounds "best". Achieving accurate sound reproduction isn't about black magic -- various types of distortion can be detected and frequency response measured, etc.
Sometime back in the 50s or 60s a leading hi-fi magazine conducted a experiment: Listeners were selected and told they would be listening to a new state of the art sound system. They were asked to adjust the bass and treble of the system until the speakers sounded "realistic". Most of the participants cut the upper mid-range and the highs and felt many adjusted were needed in order for the sound to sound "real". However, what these folks didn't know was that they were actually listening to real musicians playing behind a curtain, and the bass and treble controls were a series of baffles that blocked the appropriate bass or treble sounds. In other words most of the these folks didn't think the real sound sounded real.
That's how a lot of people explain the success of products they don't like -- the people who buy them must have been tricked into it.
I'll agree with your statements... to a point. But the concept of "tastes" is largely a product of people who don't have any idea what the "real thing" sounds like. For example, most non-musicians and casual listeners tend to think speakers equalized with a "smile curve" sounds "best". Achieving accurate sound reproduction isn't about black magic -- various types of distortion can be detected and frequency response measured, etc.
Sometime back in the 50s or 60s a leading hi-fi magazine conducted a experiment: Listeners were selected and told they would be listening to a new state of the art sound system. They were asked to adjust the bass and treble of the system until the speakers sounded "realistic". Most of the participants cut the upper mid-range and the highs and felt many adjusted were needed in order for the sound to sound "real". However, what these folks didn't know was that they were actually listening to real musicians playing behind a curtain, and the bass and treble controls were a series of baffles that blocked the appropriate bass or treble sounds. In other words most of the these folks didn't think the real sound sounded real.
You've kind of talked yourself out of your own point, I think. Sound quality is largely subjective, a perception issue. People know what they like and accuracy hasn't got a lot do with it. Speaker sound quality is often described even by audiophiles (or especially by audiophiles) using terms that sound like words that might be used by a wine critic: warm, soft, edgy, open, harsh, sweet, mellow. It's more art than science.
"Sound quality" isn't as subjective as many believe. Thanks to science sound can be predicted, detected, measured, and analyzed, etc.
But yes, I realize some believe the world is only a few thousand year old and that science is a deception of Beelzebub.
"Sound quality" isn't as subjective as many believe. Thanks to science sound can be predicted, detected, measured, and analyzed, etc.
But yes, I realize some believe the world is only a few thousand year old and that science is a deception of Beelzebub.
I think what's lost in your argument is there's no right way to listen to music.
I'm not a fan of Bose, but I can see how their products would appeal to many people's ears. But it's not a trick or marketing - it's just how they sound. And some people (as much as you or I may not understand it) prefer this sound.
It's not a law that your home theater needs to sound as much like real-life as possible. Even if you think that's what you're accomplishing when you piece it together (or buy a home theater in a box setup, as the case may be) the end result that you're satisfied with may be miles away from "real" (as your story about the experiments shows) but still the preferred sound.
If someone is buying it, and tuned it a certain way and is listening to it and prefers it more than another system - even if that other system is a high-end audiophile, top-rated, hand crafted system - then how can you deny them their preference? No matter what you do or say, their ears like their own setup. It would be no different than calling them wrong for painting their living room a certain color, or choosing the outfit they did.
It even ties in to the very idea of music and why what some people love to listen to can be garbage to someone else.
Relax. I'm not denying anyone the right to believe anything they can imagine is actually real.
If you think science, acoustics and physics, etc. aren't "real", so be it.
Well, Dr. Bose did graduate from and teach at MIT in the first place.
Having worked at Bose and met Dr. Bose, I can't see him wanting to sell to anyone. The company is allowing him to profit from his research from his MIT days. He is already very wealthy, so he doesn't need the money from Apple.
If you think science, acoustics and physics, etc. aren't "real", so be it.
In a world where some people think different colored M&Ms taste different, that every Mac OS update makes the Finder "zippier" and that Budweiser makes a palatable beer, home theater preference is not at the top of my priorities...
Exactly. For years Consumer Reports ran these awful (IMO) tests on speaker systems. They'd rate them for "accuracy" by playing sine wave generators through them -- more accurate being better of course. But this leaves out the main factors that account for the way they actually sound, in particular, coloration. How anyone reacts to coloration is subjective. What sounds good to one person may sound terrible to another. It will also depend on they type of music they are listening to, volume levels, etc. Additionally, even if everyone owned perfectly accurate sound reproduction equipment, very few would listen to them in suitable environments. They'd still be listening to them in their homes, with all of the acoustical variations that implies.
Listening to some in this thread I gather they think that "sound" is "the final frontier" of the Natural World. Something that can only be understood via a moment of Zen.
(Pythagoras must be rolling over in his grave!)
(Pythagoras must be rolling over in his grave!)
What I said was, "Achieving accurate sound reproduction isn't about black magic".
Personal "tastes" are simply personal tastes -- and not necessarily accurate.
Probably a good thing we don't allow people to build skyscrapers "by ear" in most countries...
No, what you said is,
Listening to some in this thread I gather they think that "sound" is "the final frontier" of the Natural World. Something that can only be understood via a moment of Zen.
(Pythagoras must be rolling over in his grave!)
To which you have added this positively absurd analogy,
Probably a good thing we don't allow people to build skyscrapers "by ear" in most countries...
Another potentially interesting discussion bites the dust.
Probably a good thing we don't allow people to build skyscrapers "by ear" in most countries...
Wouldn't the analogy work better if it was; "...'by eye' " ?
Anyway, Apple acquiring Bose would be retarded. Nothing to gain for Apple.
Let's try to imagine designing a buildings by ear, shall we? A 2"x12" here and a 4"x4" there sounds about right doesn't it?
Now. Let's design a killer Bose speaker system. Something little, about this size here, another one there, some hidden over there, and make sure it all looks like something that would be at home in a Zen Garden. Wow! -- really little cute things with drop-dead cutesy looks -- that sounds great doesn't it! Accuracy? Who cares about that!
Erm, hate to rain on your Bose hating parade, but Apple critics also claim that people are only tricked into buying Apple. Just because a company has brilliant marketing, doesn't mean they can't have a brilliant product.
If you look at Bose's website, they explain that they are actually very much opposed to the objective measure of sound quality. Their 901 series speaker was revolutionary simply because it embraced "inexactness"-sound unpredictably bouncing off surfaces creates a more "real" sound to most ears, even if it is not as accurate as Consumer Reports might say.
From the Bose site:
In turn, brilliant marketing goes a long way in covering up a less-than-brilliant product. it's like an economic placebo- if you make the customers think what they're buying is better, they'll be more apt to gloss over the shortcomings. Happens all the time with Apple, happens all the time with Bose.
No High's, No Low's, Must Be Bose...
I have to say I've lived by that saying for a long time but, their noise canceling headphones are pretty sweet. If you want quality audio equipment today. Break out your CC and go for McIntosh. Otherwise you can move down from there.
I have to say I've lived by that saying for a long time but, their noise canceling headphones are pretty sweet. If you want quality audio equipment today. Break out your CC and go for McIntosh. Otherwise you can move down from there.