SE-i Bose head unit observation

[carotman]

With our cars slowly becoming classics, I had the idea to slowly prepare it to return to "stockish" form regarding the radio.

I have a Bose head unit here that I thought was broken. The "BASS" knob doesn't turn completely to the right.

It turns out that this is by design!

Bose FAQ - CB7Tuner Forums

I can't believe I'm still learning new things about these cars.

[Dr_Snooz]

I spent a few years shopping for high end stereo equipment and restoring my Dad's old vacuum tube stereo. If you keep asking around in old electronics shops, vintage stereo shops and high end stereo boutiques, you can sometimes get a referral for someone who will go through your old car stereo and restore it for you. It's pretty expensive (~$600 when I was asking around 15 years ago or so), but worth it if you have an irreplaceable unit like one of those Bose's.

[AC439]

I have a Maxima which had a Bose system. I also build DIY amps/speakers for fun. The Bose system was such a pain to repair. Way too many problems. The speakers are 2 ohms (you can't drive it with regular head units) but it has a digital amp (now class-D) on every speaker which take audio signal (differntial) from the head unit. The amps would die due to electrolytic capacitors drying out. The head unit finally crap out on me and I put an aftermarket with signal adapter. Sounded ok that way but not the best. What makes it sound good is the digital amps on every speaker. Now with DIY audio community growing and digital amp boards more readily available and dirt cheap, I have built many home amps with excellent results costed me minimal. There are many 4 channels class-D amp boards that can run on 12V which certainly can be adapted into car use. I ended up totally remove all Bose stuffs from the maxima and put in a pioneer head with speakers. It sounds fine. It will allow me more options to tweak it in the future if I wanted.

You may want to check diyAudio if you interested in DIY building.

[Dr_Snooz]

I haven't been a fan of Bose since I was unfortunate enough to inherit a set of Bose 301s a decade ago. God they sounded awful. I traded a set of Cerwin Vegas for those and boy did I get the short end of that stick. I could wake the dead, two doors down with the Cerwins. With the Bose I couldn't hear any bass at all, just a lot of screechy midrange. Ugh. You can get better sound on a Montgomery Ward stereo from a garage sale. Bose is really gimmicky, and not worth the money, unless you have cocktail party friends you need to impress. Unless you're a numbers matching kind of guy, put a decent stereo in the car.

[AC439]

I too had a pair of 301 which I hated and then sold on ebay. No surprise here with the 301, its just sound bad, period.

There was an old slogan (saying) about this brand - "No high no low, it must be Bose...." LOL

[Dr_Snooz]

LOL. My brother used to say something similar: "there's the highs, the lows and the Bose."

[Shane86]