Bose Cinemate ???

I'm looking to simplify my home surround system..(my wife can never get it to work) I've been looking at the Cinemate from Bose and was curious if anyone has one..and what they think of it.

Depending on the equipment you already have, it might be easier and cheaper to just get a quality programmable remote. There are remotes that are infinitely learning and you can program them with macros. For example, you could hit the power button to turn the system on, then press 'CD' to listen to a CD. With just this one button, the remote will send out all the required signals to turn the TV off, switch the receiver or preamp to the CD input and you're good to go.

When you're done, press the 'DVD' button and the CD player will be switched off, the DVD player and TV will come on, the input on the receiver and TV will be switched.

I don't know how cheap they are now but I know they started at about $300 a few years ago. They were all the rage in big dollar home theaters using projectors and whatnot both to simplify the UI and because most of the high end equipment couldn't be programmed and controlled by the lesser programmable remotes.

The big thing about Bose is, if you really appreciate good sound quality, it just isn't there with Bose. But if you have a $300 home theater in a box then the Bose might make sense. I'm just not a big fan of Bose at all.

The Cinemate is a new, very small theater in a box...except it uses two ft speakers and a bass module only. It's very tiny...hooks up to your tv audio outputs, and synthesizes 5.1 surround. It sounds great in the stores. I already have a larger 5 point system, but it's a bit complicated and my wife gets pissed off because my all in one remotes aren't that easy to use. I'd like to keep the big system for music, and use something like the cinemate just for TV and DVD's.

Bose stuff just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. The plain Waveradio is the best clock radio out there, but for $400 you're still just getting a nice clock radio. All the larger stuff is a rip IMHO. My uncle was given a Wave (the big one) that cost about $1200 with the accessories. I gave him a Sony receiver and a set of old Avid speakers I got at the dump and they blew it out of the water.

And their marketing is pure BS, matching their R&D. Now that I think of it, Bose is exactly the Mag-Lite of the sound system industry, only without the good value for the dollar Mag offers.

Honestly, if the Cinemate suits your needs and you're happy with the sound, then go for it. Just different people have different standards of what sounds good to their ears. I had a manager that had the $2,000 system with the built in DVD player and all that. We got to talking about speakers one day, he ended up listening to my NHT 2.5is (which are far from the best speakers in the world) and was so blown away, he got rid of the Bose, bought a basic Denon receiver, DVD player and 5 Super One speakers and a Klipsch 10" powered sub for a total of about $1,500 and it literally sounded about 1,000% percent better than the Bose. Plus the speakers have a piano black finish which most women will like and they aren't so large as to intrude into the living space.

Like I said, different strokes. I was just throwing the remote idea out there... they are so easy to use, my 3 year old (at the time) had no problem using it and controlling the whole system.

I've learnt two things about audio equipment:

1) If it sounds good to you and you're happy with it - ignore what other people think about your set-up.

2) Bose sucks.

Never under-estimate the W.A.F. when it comes to home theatre.
W.A.F. stands for wife acceptance factor.
If she can operate it and you can live with the sound then get it and cut your losses.
It's a small compromise and it'll keep the peace so give it some strong consideration.

I was farming remotes on my coffee table and was happy to do so (hey, I knew what they all did!) but one day it was "suggested" that it would look so much neater if I could reduce the # of remotes. No problemo. In came Super Duper Remote Zilla. It took me a week to program it with all the sequences and it was amazing.

The downside was nobody else could figure it out and after giving everyone 5 lessons on how to use it, it created more friction than it was worth.

Sometimes simple is best.

i think bose is good i hd some 901 they was good ,now i onbly listen to music on headphones cause i listen to it loud and i hate to distuturb folks

901s weren't terrible. Bose made some good bookshelf speakers a while back.

Right now I'm running a couple Klipsch Hereseys, and trying to decide between a NAD 3045 or a Rotel RA-840BX amp. This is just for audio. I'm not a home theater junkie.

I like the sound of the Bose radio, it's just overhyped for the price.

Right now I'm running a couple Klipsch Hereseys...

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Hereseys, huh? Cool! Old Man Klipsch was an interestig fellow... Naming speakers designed for church PA systems the Heresey...

I don't count myself a huge fan of Klipsch speakers but one of the most amazing experiences I had while I was big into audio was the BIG Klipsches, the corner horn loaded everythings that were like $4,000. I heard them run off the headphone jack of a Sony Discman... Those things were so effecient that they could fill the room with sound from a cheap headphone jack!

Of course, they took up half the room.

I don't have a Bose Cinemate, but I have never been impressed with Bose at all. They sound great if you hear them in the Bose Showroom, with a sound room that is specifically made for the speakers, but once you bring them home and install them in your living room, they sound absolutely horrible.. Unlike all the marketing hype you see on their brochures, it seems that Bose Systems are extremely sensitive to the environment that they are put into and there is almost no way to overcome this short of building/altering a room specifically to suit them.

I've had a Nakamichi SoundSpace 12 for about 5 years now, and have been pretty happy. This was a compromise between having to source individual components to build a home theatre/sound system, and making them all fit together properly, versus buying a complete system that looks good and are perfectly matched.

The system comes with two different remotes, a full size learning remote, and a mini remote that has only the most used buttons. Even though the full size remote isn't programable, i.e. no macro, it replaces all the other remotes so you won't have to use up table space. It's also not too difficult to use, as even my wife is able to get the system to do what she wants.. :laughing:

Sound wise, it's fantastic for home theatre as it has a qood dynamic range and is able to produce very good bass due to having two sub woofers.

Obviously, you can't compare the Soundspace 12 to the Cinemate as the price is significantly more, but you might want to take a look at the lower end home theatre systems from Nakamichi instead of Bose...

I'd even give Bose more of a benefit of the doubt with regards to sound quality. I think for folks that haven't heard really good sound quality, of course they sound decent... it's punchy, has quasi bass (usually derived from electrical equalization rather than quality drivers and cabinets) and as noted, they are usually small.

But if you take one of those mini speakers apart (the kind that have two pods connected together), you will see that they use drivers that on an open market probably cost less than $.50 each. The inductors and capacitors in the crossovers of quality speakers cost more than that.

There's a trite, but true, saying in audio circles... 'No highs, no lows, must be Bose.'

Having said that, if the guy is happy with the sound and the woman is happy with the looks and easy of use, then go for it!

Size 15's has the message right, but his order is wrong. #2 should be first. Bose makes some of the most overhyped, overpriced stuff out there. I bought a Wave radio years ago, but anyway one cuts it, $300 for a glorified clock radio is way too much. There are other companies who make similar surround systems...Look into them. I know that Yamaha makes one, and I believe Boston.

No highs, no mids, no lows. That's Bose! :nana:

cratz2 said:

Hereseys, huh? Cool! Old Man Klipsch was an interestig fellow... Naming speakers designed for church PA systems the Heresey...

I don't count myself a huge fan of Klipsch speakers but one of the most amazing experiences I had while I was big into audio was the BIG Klipsches, the corner horn loaded everythings that were like $4,000. I heard them run off the headphone jack of a Sony Discman... Those things were so effecient that they could fill the room with sound from a cheap headphone jack!

Of course, they took up half the room.

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I gather they were named after someone said to Klipsch that making a small speaker that sounded good were be heresy. They may have been the second model of speaker he made after the Klipschorn designs (the ones you heard). My Heresys are a little bright for my tastes but they're the best speakers I could find for free. Also got a pair of Klipsch KG4s I'm probably going to sell.

Oh no! You guys have spoiled my plans! I was thinking of replacing my old and dying clock radio in my bedroom with a Bose CD waveradio. You probably saved me from a $500.00 mistake!! They are very expensive but the hype has them as being tremendous with great sound for their size. My wife and I would like a good quality clock radio & CD player that has decent sound for a bedroom, but we don't want the seperate speakers, amp, and all that other stuff. Now that you all have put Bose in its proper place, what should I get? My $19.95 clock radio is 20+ years old, drifting off freq. and soon to be gone. What should I look at?

As a stereo clock radio the Bose Wave radio with CD is beyond great. As a $500 home stereo system it's weak.

The Cinemate is a great idea but look at the same type system in a Nero. Read the reviews, it's impressive for a virtual surround system and beats the Bose Cinemate. The down side to the Nero is I think you can only get it directly from Nero. Both are around $1k.