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DVD-philes: anyone familiar with the BOSE 3-2-1 systems?

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H

heavy liquid

Member
All of the home theater people over at hometheaterforum.com and avsforum.com will tell you to stay far, far away from Bose. Bose is incredibly overrated. If you want small speakers, I'd look for some nice bookshelves instead. You're also much better off getting seperate components, and can probably do so for around the same price with a little research and some smart shopping. I just recently bought all of my stuff for about the same price of that, minus the subwoofer. Still need to get that. Yeah, it's more work to piece together your system, but what you end up with really makes it worthwhile to do so.

EDIT: I bought these Polk cherry wood floorstanding speakers from Outpost.com to use as my surround speakers. Not only do they kick ass, but they look awesome too! They're a steal at $50 each. Note that the picture they have is for the black ones. They're actually this color:

3202_lsi9.jpg


The r-15 cherry wood bookshelves are also $50:

http://shop3.outpost.com/product/4205294?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG
 
P

pj

Banned
bishoptl said:
http://www.bose.com/controller?even...ent/help_choose/recommend/mwr_321_netflix.jsp

I saw the ad in Car and Driver, and I'm looking to switch out my old home theater (been kicking around for 7 bloody years now) for something much newer and sexier. The only problem I can see is that it supports 5.1 digital encoding, but frankly I doubt I'd need 7.1 right now. Anyone experienced the BOSE difference and care to share?
Click to expand...

The bose 3-2-1 is a 2.1 speaker system, so it's not 5.1, and their subwoofers are very very bad. Unless you plan on devoting huge amounts of time obsessing over speaker choices, you don't want an audio/dvd-phile's opinion.

Easy to find brands that are better than bose:

Speakers: Polk, Klipsch, JBL
Receivers: Harmon-kardon, denon, onkyo, pioneer

Go to best buy, listen around and buy what you like best. Unless you want to go the audiophile route, in which case I have about 4000 links you should read....
 
C

CueTheMusic

Member
If you just want a home theater in a box, check out Onkyo... I've heard good things about their packages. Realistically though, you will get a lot nicer system buying seperates. Stay far, far away from Bose.... please.
 
L

Lucky Forward

Member
I too have always heard that Bose was overrated and overpriced, and that you can get a far better system for the same money by buying individual components. Check out a store like Tweeter, I got my Yamaha receiver/amp and Mirage speakers from them.

About the only advantage to Bose that I've heard of is the small, unobtrusive size of their components, if that is important to you. But by the same token, they say that in order to have big, full sound, the speakers must be moving a large volume of air, and that means sizeable woofers and sub-woofer.
 
T

truffleshuffle83

Banned
i got an onkyo. under 500 6.1 1000 watts. puts everything under a grand to shame. if you get the onkyo, invest in monster cables cuase the speaker cable they provide is junk
 
H

heavy liquid

Member
truffleshuffle83 said:
if you get the onkyo, invest in monster cables cuase the speaker cable they provide is junk
Click to expand...

For speaker wire, just go over to Home Depot or Lowe's and pick up some 14 or 12 gauge there. It's just as good as anything you'd buy elsewhere, and way cheaper. I think it was about $35 for 100 feet when I bought mine.
 
M

Mrbob

Member
I'm looking at getting new speakers/amp later this year.

The BOSE 3-2-1 are OK. If you are limited on space. BUT, not worth a grand.

I've been eyeing these speakers as I hear their great:

http://www.ascendacoustics.com/

Then I'll find a decent amp. I prefer Yamaha amps. Always treated me well.
 
P

pj

Banned
Mrbob said:
I'm looking at getting new speakers/amp later this year.

The BOSE 3-2-1 are OK. If you are limited on space. BUT, not worth a grand.

I've been eyeing these speakers as I hear their great:

http://www.ascendacoustics.com/

Then I'll find a decent amp. I prefer Yamaha amps. Always treated me well.
Click to expand...


Ascend is what I've been looking at too. They're so ugly that you KNOW all the money is going towards making them sound good. Plus all the reviews/impressions are good.

..AND AEROGEL!
 
T

truffleshuffle83

Banned
speaker shells? the speakers are solid wood but the faces are removable plastic. the sub hits hard. its just a beauty in action. you cannot go wrong with this. my friends have bose systems and they are more impressed by mine than their own. ive seen systems that cost over 2 grand that dont compete. the setup is huge though. the box it comes in is probably 5 feet tall by 4 feet by 4 feet and weighs about 250 pounds. but it packs the punch
 
T

teh_pwn

"Saturated fat causes heart disease as much as Brawndo is what plants crave."
If you're going to pay tons for speakers get something like Klipsch.

Bose has become a brand name with little substance.
 
H

heavy liquid

Member
Mrbob said:
Then I'll find a decent amp. I prefer Yamaha amps. Always treated me well.
Click to expand...

You should check out the Pioneer 1014TX. I just purchased it a few months ago, and love it. It's also highly respected over at avsforum.

It's a 7.1 THX 110 watts x 7 beast. It also does two very cool things: It has Automatic MCACC (Multi-Channel Acoustic Calibration System), which basicially calibrates the sound to perfectly fit your specific speaker arrangement. The other neat thing it does is the Dolby Pro-Logic IIx can create 7.1 channels from 2-channel sources, which is VERY cool. It's basically as good as any of the Pioneer $1,000 and up ELITE series, but for a fraction of the price (it's $350 at onecall).
 
A

aoi tsuki

Member
truffleshuffle83 said:
i got an onkyo. under 500 6.1 1000 watts. puts everything under a grand to shame. if you get the onkyo, invest in monster cables cuase the speaker cable they provide is junk
Click to expand...
Monster is another overrated brand. If you're spending a couple of grand total on your home theater audio, you still probably won't see much improvement with Monster over say, Acoustic Research, or even a shielded bulk 14-gauge cable from Radio Shack, Home Depot, etc.

onkyo
this is exactly what i have. i would definatly recommend it
Click to expand...
This is the successor to HTIB i've got. Excellent sound quality with plenty of inputs, though everything is big (speakers especially), and the speakers are clearly the weak link in the package, which is usually the case. For the price, you won't find anything better than Onkyo.

Damn. That is a nice inexpensive set. Are the speaker shells plastic on the outside?
Click to expand...
Judging by my set, it's some kind of wood panelling. i'm guessing it's plastic, but it textured quite well and doesn't look cheap.
 
J

JayFro

Banned
heavy liquid said:
You should check out the Pioneer 1014TX. I just purchased it a few months ago, and love it. It's also highly respected over at avsforum.

It's a 7.1 THX 110 watts x 7 beast. It also does two very cool things: It has Automatic MCACC (Multi-Channel Acoustic Calibration System), which basicially calibrates the sound to perfectly fit your specific speaker arrangement. The other neat thing it does is the Dolby Pro-Logic IIx can create 7.1 channels from 2-channel sources, which is VERY cool. It's basically as good as any of the Pioneer $1,000 and up ELITE series, but for a fraction of the price (it's $350 at onecall).
Click to expand...

I have the same receiver hooked up with 4 Infinity Primus 250 floor standing speakers, and infinity center channel speaker and a 10" dayton sub woofer. Total cost was around $1,300. So for a couple hundred dollars more than that Bose you can have a system that sounds 10x better.

Stay away from Bose :)
 
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