Sound Quality, Accurate Musical Reproduction, Style.

Could use 2 subs, but not neccessary

I bought the 701 SERIES II a week ago and have been amazed everyday since. These speakers have great sound reproduction. I will admit they need a little power I initially hooked them up to an old JVC amp 50 watts and it wasn't there then I hooked them up to my Onkyo TX-ds696 WOW. I have the 161 rears and the vcs-10 center and they sound unbeleivable in my living room.
To any one who doughts the quality of Bose. Please actually by a set and then you will understand. Oh and don;t hook them up to some lame receiver either you have to have powerful quality feed. Its like the old car saying :" Theres no replacement for Displacement" In other words more power more sound. And for the married people out there my wife actually enjoyed the sound. That says alot if you no what I mean.

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AR HC-6

Clarity, good looks.

Very weak bass.

My first Bose purchase; I've always bought Infinity or JBL before. To be honest, I bought the 701s primarily because of the form factor: I needed tall / thin cabinets in my family room. They look great, and sound okay, but I had to boost the bass with a dbx box and subwoofer for movies. If I had it to do over again, I'd still buy the 701s, but Infinity makes a similar-looking system for about a third less $$...

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Infinity, JBL.

Performs reasonably well with a receiver with a strong current driving them. Good General all round Heavy Duty Monitor.

Maybe a bit Boomy in the bass...need to really place these in the right spot for it to even start to sound OK.

Seems to be always begging for a gutsy receiver to pump them into action. I understand what a lot of the the other owners are complaining about. If you have a small to medium size receiver amp with a modest current, the 701's will most likely sound really flat, especially if not placed correctly in the room. Also, keep them well back from the wall. (mine sits nearly 12"" from the wall) They need plenty of air space, especially when you crank up the power.
I suppose in summing up, they will work reasonably well, they are certainly not the best one can buy, they are heavy duty, and have similarities to public address type monitors.

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Going back a way but similar to to days of the old Cerwin Vega monitors (with the red surround)

A few people were impressed

I was not impressed.

I was in the midst of building a new stereo. I thought I would go with the Bose 701's. I went out and bought a Pioneer Elite receiver and cd player. I hooked up the 701's and could not help but think after hearing them, that 300 dollar speakers sound better. I did a lot of shoping around for the next week. I sent the 701's back because I found something better at the same price. I found a speaker that made the 701 sound compressed in the midrange, shrill in the highs, and oh so boomy in the lower end. I have since moved on and replaced those speakers with better ones, but I would never buy a set of Bose speakers again. I felt that for the price, the 701's just don't compete with other speakers in the 500-800 dollar price range. If the 701's were 150 dollars I would felt cheated. I have to wonder about a company that releases no information that we audiophiles want to know. Better sound through research my ass.

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I have only used the 301 direct reflecting speaker before.

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Let me start by saying that I cant wait to evaluate the 701's in my home! There is so much hype (+ and -) surrounding these speakers that I cant wait to make my own judgement (remember when people were still capable of such behavior?)

Some background: I'm an electrical engineer and avid physicist, however, I know the difference between published specs and real world results (Bose bashers take note).

I'm a musician of 15 years so I'm confident in stating that my ear is more developed than the multitude of "audiophiles" out there who barely understand the mechanics of what they speak of (its so easy to sound like you know what your talking about when you use big boy words like "bandwidth" and "directional vectors") - Bose bashers take additional note: the human ear is NOT a goddamn oscilloscope! The guy that speaks of the 12hz rolloff really should get out more! Someone that claims his ear can both respond to and distinguish between a gap of 8hz between the bands of 12 - 20hz is Superman (he can probably fly too).

I have evaluated a multitude of speaker systems in the past and have generally found Bose to be quite a "musical" sounding speaker (not all models). I generally agree that Bose tends to skimp on construction (both with drivers and cabinets/materials - I'm a fan of the extruded varieties of cones with rubber or butyl surrounds, something you dont see with any Bose product). The truth is that if I had the $$$ to truly satisfy my audio appetite, I'd go out and buy the fricken Vienna Beethovens. Problem with that is the $4k price tag (does anyone see where I'm going with this yet?). "Audiophiles" love to drop obscure names with excessively high price tags because the multitude of them feel that you cant be a serious listener without mortaging the farm. I'll bet the Vienna (any number of models) will blow away anything Bose currently offers - and they should because you just dropped $4-10k on them!

Anyway, I feel confident enough because I'll have plenty of time to evaluate them and if I'm displeased with their performance, I'll return them since Bose gives you 90 days (correct me if I'm wrong). Either way, my evaluation will be based upon SOUND and which characteristics please (or displease) MY ear. When I began reading these evals, it quickly became clear that I wasnt going to derive much of anything useful with all the biased (+ and -) opinions floating around. Shame on you all!

I'll let you all know what I think (to anyone with individual tendencies, this will mean very little, as it should). Rest assured that it will be an honest, real-world eval based upon sound characteristics and will have absolutely nothing to do with my beef with their marketing department.

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KLH, Infinity, MTX, Klipsh, Pioneer, Vienna Acoustics, Mirage, Sony, more

Looks,

Overpriced for what you get. You can do better for the $$

Bose...talk about a love/hate relationship! People either love 'em or hate 'em. However, after owning a pair of these for a few months, I can relate to both sides of the "argument". Rationally speaking, I think that what Audiophiles truly dislike about these speakers is they are over-priced and over-hyped not that they just sound bad. They know there are better sounding speakers for the money. If these speakers were sold for half the money, you would see a lot less complaints or maybe none at all. Depending upon the type of music you listen to, these speakers can sound pretty decent. But throw some classical material at them and you'll know why some people hate these speakers. There are worse speakers out there. But, they are usually much less expensive. Price not being an issue, these are not awful speakers but when factoring in the price, as most of us have to do, that's when people are offended.

As for the people who like really like these speakers, think of the analogy below.

Musicians learn at a very early stage that sound is a relative thing. It is relative to other sounds and sound quality. For example, the instrument a beginner plays may sound great until he hears a superior instrument. Every musician has experienced this phenomenon of playing what they feel is a good sounding instrument until they hear something that makes their old instrument sound like a wooden salad bowl strung with bailing wire. Now their "good sounding" instrument doesn't sound good anymore and they disgard it. That is why Bose sound "good" to so many people and why I bought them.

I bought mine from a Bose store that only sold Bose speakers. So naturally, they sounded pretty decent to me in the store. Furthermore, much of the music I auditioned them on and listen to are poor recordings or have little frequency range such as folk music and quiet acoustic music. But when listenting to classical, piano, or anything with a high range of frequency or many instruments playing at the same time and these speakers start sounding compressed and dull. It becomes very difficult to hear all the elements of the music if there is a lot going on in the piece.

Those who are considering buying these, shop around and compre these speakers side by side to others in their price range. Compare them with the music you listen to but also to other types of music. If you own speakers for several years you may venture into other types of music and come to find they fall short in some areas. If you do indeed think they are superior then, by all means, you should purchase them. You are the final judge. But, beware, after your ears mature you may soon discover the "good sounding" speakers you bought don't sound so "good" when compared to something else.

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Klipsch, Tannoy, B&W, Mission,

Great speakers

None

It is quit clear that this review site is of no value to the average person. I am trying to figure out what all the reviewers are so angry about. The Bose product must be exceptional because otherwise no one would go to such lengths as in here. Most of the bad reviews are from people who do not own the Bose 701's so there reviews do not belong here. These reviews must be from children because no level of maturity is shown. Children have a right to review but all should read the reviews with that in mind. This process has no value for buying speakers.

I own the Bose 701's. They are great speaskers. That is the bottom line.

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All the top brands

WARNING!!!
If you are not an ardent BOSE proponent, and you have posted a negative review of a bose product, you may be subjected to the wrath of an individual who goes by the moniker "Mr. Bose". He will come to you in stealth, with a foul tongue and an equally lacking vocabulary totally void of any degree of usefull coherency. This person is evidently either retarted or perhaps a crack adict.

Mr. BOSE: We know your out there, however your cowardice is evident in the fact that you don't give anyone the opportunity to respond to you maniacal ravings. This will not be tolerated. At least When I write a to reviewer I give them a chance to retort. Mr. Bose, it is well that you are devoted to your cause, nevertheless, it is unfortunate that you lack the intelligence to convey your ignorant beliefs. It is advisable that you consult a dictionary which, just in case you weren't aware, is a book which may bestow upon you startling revalations about the mechanics of intelligent expression. I await your response.

Compact size, Midrange, wide soundstage...

Spring clip conectors...

OK!
Enough already! I’ve been using these speakers for almost a year and can’t believe how so many people are “ripping” them... I may not be an expert, but I’ve heard a few speakers in my day, and 701’s sound real good! For all the “wanabee” audio engineers out there…”Get over yourself” These are very good speakers for music and small home theater systems. There are plenty of mass produced goods out there: Honda, Windows, Sony, etc. Just because something has mass marketing does not mean low quality! The sound of these speakers will blow away most others in a blind test.

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Infinity, JBL...

High WAF, Looks Futuristic, The Name Impresses Non-Audiophile Friends.

Pretty Much Everything if Audio is Involved. Build Quality for that Matter Too.

My wife and I stopped in at an audio store and were walking around when we came to the Bose display. These 701's were hooked up to a Pioneer 509 receiver. I decided to play around.

As soon as the $alesman saw us standing there, he imediately came over and offered to help. I asked him if he had any demo disks and he threw on Best of Sade. I also have this at home and is a very good test for imaging and female vocals.

The music starts playing and my wife and I look at each other like WTF is this junk. No image! The sound was coming from both speakers. I tried bringing the 701's off of the low display shelf to the floor and position them. I crouched down between them as if I were sitting. Still no image.

To top it off, the midrange sounded very harsh and the bass drivers would pop when turned up too loud. It sounded like the treble would only go to 12KHz. These sounded awfull.

IMHO, wake up everyone. I am not an audiophile with esoteric gear but for the price of these speakers, you could get yourself something with 50 times the performance. Seriously. For half the price, you could still do better and buy a DVD player or something.

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B&W, Tannoy, Infinity, Def. Tech, Monitor Audio, Paridigm, PSB, etc. All these lines have products at this price point.