Bose Wave Music System (Graphite Gray)

• A bold new standard in audio performance. It may well become the primary music system in your home
• Easy to use: no buttons, credit card-sized infrared remote, and MP3 CD capability
• Distinctive and elegant design: streamlined styling with a thin, slot-loaded CD player

I've had my Bose for about two years. I'm very glad to have received it as a present because, despite some of its fine features, it certainly does not merit the hefty, comparable-to-a-small-home-stereo price tag.

I like its design and its sound.

I don't like the following "features":

1) It is the most sensitive CD player I have. It will not properly play a number of CDs, especially CD-Rs. If a disc is slightly thin, the unit will either not accept it (you have to give it a push) or not eject it (you have to open up the unit, turn it on, hit "eject," and pull the disc out). This is especially annoying when my $70 boombox plays them without a problem. Refurbishing by Bose did nothing to change my unit's sensitivity.

2) It is not programmable! It doesn't program songs at all. The best it can do is "shuffle," "shuffle repeat," "repeat track," and "repeat disc." The cheapest boombox these days is programmable.

3) The lack of buttons is annoying: I found I had to order a second remote ($10) and keep it by the box. When I called Bose about this problem, the tech suggested getting the second remote and added that a lot of people had done that. My boombox is more user-friendly (it has buttons as well as a remote).

One can argue about the merits of elegance vs. user-friendliness. But the lack of programmability and the oversensitivity of this box make it a poor buy, in my opinion.

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I have mixed feelings about the newly designed Wave System. {Only the design, NOT the sound quality, which I'm sure is still excellent.}

I have the older model {Thank God} because after just 2 yrs, and that's not very long when you consider the price. The CD player on my model with the old design started doing weird things.. It played when it felt like it. That's the only way I can describe it. So I cannot imagine how angry I would be if I owned this new style & could not get my CD out of this thing if it malfunctioned!

Now, when I had my "issue", Bose offered to "Re-manufacture" it for $125. At first I was insulted, but then I thought, "Wait a minute, for $125 they are not only going to fix the problem but they are also going to check and replace/repair anything else that may be going wrong with it so it "meets the quality standards of the Bose Corporation" & re-set the warranty." I essentially received a "new" unit for $125.00 Oh, and they also sent me a postage paid shipping box to send it to them.

This happened 3 years ago and I've had no further problems with it. So 5/5 for customer service.

As for sound, I have owned many, many audio systems in my life, large and small. NOTHING compares to this system. Well, except for attending a live performance. You will put a CD in this "Little Plastic Box" and simply be amazed at the sound that comes out!

I recently bought the larger system. Strange as it may seem, The small system actually sounds clearer to me than the large {$1,200} system.

As for this new design. I have a piece of advice. Order a replacement remote along WITH your system. Always have a back up because you will not want to wait for a new one to arrive in order to use your expensive stereo system.

Personally, I think Bose has a lot of nerve removing the manual play buttons and forcing their customers to rely on their remote.

That's why I rated it 4/5

5/5 for sound 3/5 for design {it is pretty, but it IS useless without the remote}

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Wanting to replace the boombox in my kitchen with something premium, I decided to compare my boiled-down list of tabletop radiosthe Cambridge Soundworks 740 and the Bose Wave CD. If you could only have seen the looks my wife gave me as I sat and AB'd them. :)

I was initially impressed by the Wave's good looks... until I took out the 740. It made the Wave look more like a plain-old clock radio. Although the front display on the 740 is more attractive, the Wave was easier to read when standing on angle to the unit. The 740's display of CD Text and FM radio song/station info is a really nice feature. The buttons on the 740 are arranged in a logical order with fairly easy to read function descriptions. The absence of buttons on the Wave is unfortunate. I'd rather not have to rely soley on a remote control as my only means to control the radio. Both remotes are pretty similar, but the Wave's did work a little better at further distances and angles.

The 740 can store more radio stations than the Wave, which I realized when I ran out of buttons trying to program the Wave. Speaking of radio, the 740 required more messing with the antenna to pull in the stations that the Wave was able to pull in without an antenna. The 740 comes with FM and AM antennas. The Wave comes with nada.

The sound quality difference is evident even before adjusting the settings on the 740. The Wave sounded good but the 740 was much better. Turning-on the subwoofer and setting the bass to -3 gave the best sound, IMHO. I was appalled to realize the Wave comes with no treble and bass controlsonly a talk-radio feature that acts like a loudness button only when the radio is in use, not the CD.

Unfortunately for the 740 and in-line with many other comments about it, the CD transport failed to take my disc. I was very gentle at first then became more aggressive as I figured I'd have to return it anyhow. Well, when I moved it to another room it magically started working. Maybe it isn't as mechanically reliable as the Wave, but I'm willing to take my chances. This potential issue is the only reason I'm not giving five stars. I haven't noticed the clock losing time yet as other reviewers have noted.

In summary, the 740 is sounds better, has more features, and is more attractive than the Wave. If the Wave was $250 I might have kept it instead, but at $500 this A/B comparison is over and Bose has one more open box to contend with.

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I enjoyed my old Bose Radio /CD Player for five years and decided to "upgrade" to the better sound quality of the Wave System. I purchased a Wave Music System and CD Changer. Another reviewer said the CD player in these units is Dollar-store quality. That's being generous. The base Wave unit regularly "captures" CD's, often for several days, before deciding to eject the disc. Okay, I thought, just use the Changer. Wrong. The Changer more often than not balks, skips, and otherwise rebels if you try to get it to read a disc. Sometimes if you let it "rest" for several hours it will get over the rebellion. Usually you have to unplug and "reboot" the Changer, which corrects the problem every once in a while. Both units were returned to Bose and replaced (they were good about this) but are STILL not working properly. The second Changer is actually worse than the one that was returned. I won't bother returning these units again, but won't make the mistake of purchasing Bose equipment in the future.

The CD sound quality IS better than my "old" Bose Radio/CD player (when it's working), but the "old" one is DEPENDABLE. I agree with other reviewers the radio sound quality just ain't worth the price. I don't mind having to use the remote as much as other buyers, but purchased extras in case I lost one. They're cheap.

If I could purchase the Wave Music System and CD Changer again -I wouldn't. The money I spent on these units is WAY too much for the quality. Bose used to deliver quality to their customers. Not any more.

This is an update to my first review of December 16, 2006.

I have had this for 6 years or so, and just today I went to get

this and move it out in the garage and still was kind of cursing

it because it is just about useless.

The problem comes with there being no controls on this unit.

All the other plusses or minuses are secondary to the fact that

this damn radio/cd is useless because you have always have or

know where the remote is to operate it.

You cannot even turn the thing off without the remote.

A hundred times I wish now I had never bought this miserable

annoying and very expensive sound system.

I have the first Bose Wave Radio and I use it almost every day

because I can walk over and turn on the radio, hit the presets,

listen to the station I want, or set it to AUX and listen to my

another source with it (the first one did not have a CD player)

I have not used this Bose Wave Music System in years, and I

finally realized I can use it as a speaker system for my computer

always leaving it on in the same position, or move it out to the

garage, that is it because it is completely annoying not to have

controls on the unit.

You cannot turn it off and on in a hurry, for example if you get

a telephone call, or when you are about to go to sleep you cannot

just turn it off with on press of a button. This thing is a complete

and utter waste of time and money I really hate it with a fiery

passion at this point.

I really hate Bose too for being so poor in ergonomic design.

For example, I also have the Bose Bookshelf computer speakers

for one of my computers. I love the sound, but often they speakers

hum after being left on for a very long time. There is no off switch,

so they are not ergonomic, they waste energy. They only thing Bose

has is nice speakers, they need to turn themselves into a speaker

company and let someone with a brain and a heart design products

for real human beings.

--

First, I have a lot of experience with these clock/radio/cd players. I have the Cambridge Soundworks model, and the earlier Bose model Wave Radio that I got many years ago and now the new redesigned Bose Wave Radio.

The old Bose Wave Radio is pretty close to perfection. It has buttons on it and a small remote and of course the sound is fantastic. I love the older unit and still use it a lot. I had hoped to upgrade to a product that played CDs and MP3s.

I got the new version of the Bose Wave Radio, with CD ... and changer thinking it would be the best thing I ever bought. It plays CDs, and in MP3 format, it is newer and better! I was wrong.

I am sadly mistaken. The sound quality is fine. The problem is the ergonomics is poor ... the feel of the machine to operate is annoying, and plus, when I think of Bose pumping out these machines and charging huge prices for what I consider to be an inferior product and after years of experience in this market it is enough to burst a blood vessel. Hear me out ...

The cost of a product like this drops dramatically when they remove all the buttons and internal wiring, which Bose did with new design. The price did not go down, but the functionality did. A blatant rip-off. It is the most irritating thing in the world to be sitting right next to the machine and have to reach over and pick up the little remote control and orient myself to its small and many buttons only to turn it off. Now think about being in bed and having to adjust anything.

When I think of the idiot who make that design tradeoff I know that Bose, however good the acoustic engineers are, is RUN BY GREEDY IDIOTS who do not think about their customers, just maximizing their profit margin! The remote control is nice, but the lack of buttons is unforgiveable and every time I look at it and think about using it I end up not bothering unless it is daytime and I am going to be listening to the radio for a long time.

Another thing, it is nice that they have some capacitor storage inside to keep the channel presents in the case of a power outage ... why they did not do this in the earlier unit is beyond me, but when I power on the new unit with the CD it takes longer to "boot" than my PC and makes all kinds of noise.

The digital readout is too small to be seen across the room which was true of the old unit and true of the Cambridge Audio unit as well.

What I see now when I look at Bose is a company that is all Brand, and taking advantage of it .... the play the game cleverly. They have the best sound of any of these radios and they know it, so they play games with the consumer. Did they put out an MP3 player first? No they waited until their competition did, and then they out out a product that is basically crippled and that their customers will not be happy with. Eventually to be happy with will it have to buy something else, perhaps a new Bose when they put back the buttons on it.

OK ... I am ranting here a bit, but this is important to me and it should be to all consumers. Why can't I get what I want. Why can't I expect what is a world class company to create a 100% world class product ... not just in terms of the sound, but the whole package? They charge enough for it ... it is a piece of plastic with way fewer parts than any of its competitors.

At this point my attitude about Bose is so negative that I will never again buy anything they ever make, and I hope to spread my opinions and experiences to anyone who will listen to me in hopes that they will either go out of business or decide to go back to serving their customers by designing an excellent product that meets their needs. I believe this thumbing of the nose to their customer pattern follow through to most of their products as well.

I hate to be so negative especially about a company who has some good expertise in what they do, but I would have to say avoid this and all Bose products until whoever is in charge of their rip-off customer unfriendly engineering organization is long gone and someone who has a clue gets the job.