Why does it say BOSE and they SUCK so much?

[Av8torjim]

I was wondering why Bose would do this - by eliminating two tweeters from a "premium audio system" on CX-5 which definitely sacrifices the quality of high notes. Any decent audio system has tweeters. The all mid-range 9-speaker "premium" audio system simply is NOT a good audio system!

I guess you've never heard Bose 901 speakers. I'm somewhat of an audiophile and have never considered Bose to be "high-end" (No highs, no lows, must be Bose), but they make decent products and have a great marketing department. However, the 901 model speakers approach high-end audio and they use 9 identical, full-range speakers. From Bose's web site: "Nine full-range drivers provide greater power handling than conventional speakers." Using full-range speakers avoids having to use a crossover. I'm not addressing on the setup in the CX-5 (which, by the way, I find quite adequate, if not stellar), but on the comment that all decent systems have tweeters. Perhaps most, but not all. And Bose isn't the only speaker manufacturer to use full-range drivers in some systems. Most headphones use full-range drivers as well, so good quality sound can be generated with them.

Now, did Bose spec tweeters and Mazda eliminate them to cut a few dollars? Perhaps, and that's the real issue here, isn't it?

 

[ColtX-5]

I guess you've never heard Bose 901 speakers. I'm somewhat of an audiophile and have never considered Bose to be "high-end" (No highs, no lows, must be Bose), but they make decent products and have a great marketing department. However, the 901 model speakers approach high-end audio and they use 9 identical, full-range speakers. From Bose's web site: "Nine full-range drivers provide greater power handling than conventional speakers."

I have. They require lots of EQ. Do you remember when they demo'd the 901s by plugging them into a 120V wall socket? It was supposed to show how great they were, somehow. I have never thought the 901s were more than a marketing stunt.

 

[Av8torjim]

I have. They require lots of EQ. Do you remember when they demo'd the 901s by plugging them into a 120V wall socket? It was supposed to show how great they were, somehow. I have never thought the 901s were more than a marketing stunt.

They came with their own equalizer. We had them hanging from the ceiling in the party room of my fraternity house in the late 1970s. Great sound in a large room. I've heard lots better speakers for less money, but the 901s were iconic. Right amplification and setup and they were quite acceptable. Back to the original topic now.

 

[Scythe024]

I'm actually pretty happy with the Bose. It's missing some highs which could be fixed with some tweeters as others have mentioned, but the BASS is definately there. I have the bass set to 0 and at 40 volume the rear view mirror vibrates from the bass.

 

[torquelover]

I have. They require lots of EQ. Do you remember when they demo'd the 901s by plugging them into a 120V wall socket? It was supposed to show how great they were, somehow. I have never thought the 901s were more than a marketing stunt.

Never heard the 901s, but several other Bose used light bulbs wired in to protect the drivers. This would also allow them to be plugged into the wall. When we used to push Bose speakers hard, we always got a kick out of seeing light from the ports.

I had an early 90s Infiniti M30, Q45, and Nissan Maxima. They all had 4 Bose speakers, and they all sounded great. Fast forward to now and I liked the stereo in our 6 Sport better than the 6 with Bose. Our MZ5, on the other hand, has the worst sounding stereo I have ever had in any vehicle, period. The '16 Honda CRV EX loaner in the garage, a close second to the MZ5 in award for terrible audio.

 

[brillo54]

Bose has always been controversial with their designs. The previously mentioned 901's were introduced in 1968 (I first heard them in late '71). 8 of the 9 5-1/2" drivers faced to the rear! I thought at the time they were good but not great and not worth the premium price they wanted.

I knew when I went to test drive the CX-5 I'd better test dive the Bose also. Took a thumb drive along and listened to the system for 15 - 20 minutes just sitting in the dealers lot. Once again not great but good enough that it wasn't a deal breaker.

Musical tastes and listening preferences vary so widely among people. What you find balanced and natural, I might find "boomy" and overly bright. If a sound system is that important to you, take it for a test drive first!

 

[dergibog]

Bose is crap. However to be fair, if you're an audiophile and you aren't going to buy ANY car for the stock factory system regardless of the branding. If it matters to you plan on replacing your car audio after purchase. Shouldnt really be a suprise or a big deal.

 

[bmninada]

Agreed, but other manufacturers have Bose too. In those systems the sound's better. Heck, even in Mazda's mazda6 or CX-3, the sound's better.

 

[festus]

OK now, with all this talk let me open up a pandora's box and say that an automobile is a terrible listing environment no matter what the audio system is.
1st, there are so many reflecting surfaces, i.e. all that glass and 2nd, you do not sit in a 'sweet spot' but off to the side and way too close to the speakers.

Listen to this podcast from TWIT's Home Theater Geeks about room acoustics:
https://twit.tv/shows/home-theater-geeks/episodes/289?autostart=false

In fact, if you are interested in audio I highly recommend all of his podcasts. He brings in experts and doesn't fail to bring up hard questions.

And some recordings are so poorly recorded that no matter what (home) audio system you use it sounds meh . I'd go so far to say from my own experience that most recordings suck. Get a good one, played on a good system (home) and listen to the sound stage open up with depth and clarity. You won't get that in any car. ...And then there is tire and wind noise in a car.

 

[adgjqetuo]

Well, it's a hell of a lot better than the HK system that was in my BMW 228 and that was a $875 option

Funny - I find the HK system in my Subaru to have better sound then the Bose system in our Mazda - I wouldn't have ever expected that though.

 

[sillyxone]

OK now, with all this talk let me open up a pandora's box and say that an automobile is a terrible listing environment no matter what the audio system is.

That's my conclusion as well. Unless your car has perfect insulation with no road/wind noise, as soon as you start driving, the noises will interfere with the audio and mess it up. You could certainly listen to the audio when the car is parked, and invest more quality gears just for parked mode.

Also, in order to actually enjoy the audio, I have to focus and pay attention to pick up all the little details in the music, and if I do that while driving, I'll crash for sure (I don't know how most women can multitask really well I've decided that the 6-speakers system is good enough for driving, I'd enjoy my music in my quiet living room instead.

 

[ColtX-5]

Never heard the 901s, but several other Bose used light bulbs wired in to protect the drivers. This would also allow them to be plugged into the wall. When we used to push Bose speakers hard, we always got a kick out of seeing light from the ports. .........................................

Actually, that's a common technique, especially in pro audio. At low power, the filament does not heat so its resistance remains very low. When the current (thus power) rises enough to make the filament glow, its resistance rises dramatically and limits the current to the driver in series. Choose the right bulb and you have cheap, effective tweeter savers. I included one in the tweeter circuit of one of my crossover designs.

 

[yrwei52]

I was wondering why Bose would do this - by eliminating two tweeters from a "premium audio system" on CX-5 which definitely sacrifices the quality of high notes. Any decent audio system has tweeters. The all mid-range 9-speaker "premium" audio system simply is NOT a good audio system!

I guess you've never heard Bose 901 speakers. I'm somewhat of an audiophile and have never considered Bose to be "high-end" (No highs, no lows, must be Bose), but they make decent products and have a great marketing department. However, the 901 model speakers approach high-end audio and they use 9 identical, full-range speakers. From Bose's web site: "Nine full-range drivers provide greater power handling than conventional speakers." Using full-range speakers avoids having to use a crossover. I'm not addressing on the setup in the CX-5 (which, by the way, I find quite adequate, if not stellar), but on the comment that all decent systems have tweeters. Perhaps most, but not all. And Bose isn't the only speaker manufacturer to use full-range drivers in some systems. Most headphones use full-range drivers as well, so good quality sound can be generated with them.

Now, did Bose spec tweeters and Mazda eliminate them to cut a few dollars? Perhaps, and that's the real issue here, isn't it?

Yeah, no highs, no lows, it must be Bose. is always a common criticism from high-end audio world to Bose speakers. I listened to Bose 901 long time ago and I'd never liked it, including all Bose speakers with mostly reflected sound. I was not impressed with the use of electrical equalization to compensate for deficiencies in the speakers at the high and low ends of the audio range as 901 uses 9 full-range 4"-cone drivers.

According to bmninada, Bose did recommend 2 tweeters at front dash on CX-5 like Mazda6's Bose system, but Mazda had decided to eliminate them to save few dollars. To me and bmninada, that's a real issue! This is the indication that Mazda's attitude to disregard the recommendation from professionals. What else Mazda did this way we haven't found out?

 

[runesatre@yahoo]

Actually, you missed the part where Mazda added the FLUX CAPACITOR to the SKYACTIV engine....

Now we're talking

 

[CX-5um]

Does anyone know if you can take a used OEM BOSE spare tire subwoofer and install it in post 2014 Mazdas with BOSE. In other words will older Bose woofers be plug and play to the current BOSE systems.

 

[yrwei52]

Does anyone know if you can take a used OEM BOSE spare tire subwoofer and install it in post 2014 Mazdas with BOSE. In other words will older Bose woofers be plug and play to the current BOSE systems.

I was thinking the same thing after I saw the Bose spare-tire subwoofer on a CX-3. But after I saw those people who have to tap the front speaker wire getting the signal for their subwoofer amp, I gave up. Apparently there is no additional output ports on the back of Bose head-unit. And this is not going to be plug and play as we have wished. Besides, this Bose spare-tire subwoofer is expensive!

 

[silvercoat]

Does anyone know if you can take a used OEM BOSE spare tire subwoofer and install it in post 2014 Mazdas with BOSE. In other words will older Bose woofers be plug and play to the current BOSE systems.

Usually not. As the vehicles have way different wiring harnesses. If something is based on the same unibody you might get lucky. In the case of the current Mazda the CX5/6/3/CX3 are all different BOSE systems in their own right from my understanding.

 

[ColtX-5]

Why does it say BLOSE and Suck So Much, Here's Why!

I finally got around to curving my 2015 Blose audio system. I used an HP 204C signal generator into the AUX in port. The curve is of the right channel with the volume set to 25, max bass CUT, treble at +4 tics and fader 4 tics to the rear. The meter was a Rat Shack Analog meter, aimed at the right most A/C vent and the readings were corrected using the published correction curve for the analog meter. The engine was off and all the windows and doors were all shut. The left channel did not change the response curve much, other than adding ~10 dB.

I have fooled with this thing from the day I got it trying to get a nearly flat curve and this is the best I can do, with just fader, bass and treble. More treble raises the 3k screech without improving the response above 7k. It appears the tone controls are shelving types and there is no way to kill the 14 dB (Dayum!!!!!) hump at 40 Hz. Remember, 10 dB is twice/half as loud, 14 dB is getting close to 3x different. Realistically, +/- 5 dB is good, especially in a car, and you might listen through the +/- 8dB swings in the midrange, but this system is supposedly custom designed for this vehicle and EQ'd just for it. Blose(/Mazda?) utterly FAILED. There is little point in trying for response above 15k in a car because of wind noise and most people can't hear that high (I can't).

I'd say there is no solution other than to replace the Blose Amp, front door woofers and dash tweeters.

 

[yrwei52]

Usually not. As the vehicles have way different wiring harnesses. If something is based on the same unibody you might get lucky. In the case of the current Mazda the CX5/6/3/CX3 are all different BOSE systems in their own right from my understanding.

Actually new Mazda6, Mazda3, and CX-5 are having similar Bose system setup with different number and size of speakers. Mazda6 has 11 speakers, but Mazda3 and CX-5 have 9 speakers with a pair of 1" dash tweeters missing. Mazda6 and Mazda3 have newer version of Bose Centerpoint 2 Surround Sound and AudioPilot 2, but CX-5 has older Centerpoint and AudioPilot.

CX-3 has totally different Bose 7-speaker audio sound system with tweeters and spare-tire subwoofer but without Centerpoint and AudioPilot,

 

[yrwei52]

Why does it say BLOSE and Suck So Much, Here's Why!

I'd say there is no solution other than to replace the Blose Amp, front door woofers and dash tweeters.

Actually there is no dash tweeters for CX-5 Bose system. According to Bose, three dash speakers on CX-5 are 3" (8cm) mid-range Twiddler.