I don't care how many speakers Bose tries to cram into a car...it's garbage. The most ENTRY level aftermarket HU's, amps, and drivers run circles around Bose. I could replace the 14 speaker system in a C8 with 6 speakers 1 amp and a sub and CRUSH the OEM crap. The ONLY appropriate thing to do with Bose is immediately remove it from your car, put it into a consolidated pile in your driveway, bring your neighbors over and hand them a couple sledgehammers and say knock yourself out. As they're smashing that garbage, you emerge from your garage with a gallon of 87 octane to douse it with and then toss in a lit road flare.

Bose is utter garbage and needs to be treated like it is. Composted, burned, flushed, or recycled into better ****. Bose can eat an entire bag of dicks.

 

I'll just be honest.

Its far from bad but its nothing to write home about IMO. Maybe part of the problem is I listen a lot on Sirus XM.

 

Listening source does make a big difference. Rip your CD in high bit rate and play them over USB, sound much better than anything come through any radio!

I'll also say this though, the C8 speaker systems does sound better in one aspect: the bass is tight. This is very apparent when listening to music that's a bit more delicate in different frequencies such as classical music. Compare to all the other audio systems I have listened to, C8's bass is the best and all others bass sounded just muddy and boomy. The only one I have not listened to extensively that can be a good comparison, is the Mark Livingson premier audio system in Lexus, which I am looking forward to do the comparison with C8 when I get the RX 450H as my next SUV to replace my MDX later this year.

 

Mark Levinson Audio is ultra-high end, audiophile grade hardware. Bose on the other hand...not.

 

My sentiments exactly--until you rip and listen to the system with high quality tracks. The source material is key. Garbage in, garbage out. HD FM is far better than XM.

 

Just curious, do you have a C8, and have you actually listened to the audio system in the car?

In general I agree with you about Bose, but the C8 does seem somewhat better than is typical for Bose.

Sirius is really, truly, horribly bad audio. In the beginning, it wasn't actually too bid, but the bandwidth available to them is fixed, yet they've crammed so many more channels into that same bandwidth they had no choice but to cut the audio quality in both sampling bit rate and massive compression. You're better off listening to mp3 files from your phone over bluetooth than Sirius. And mp3 over BT is far from high fidelity.

 

Don't have one...but I sat in one and listened to it. Same boring garbage. Bose thinks they can solve the problem with more speakers and even have this garbage idea to channel "artificially enhanced engine noise" over your music. Same logic they used in the caddy putting 36 freaking speakers in the car. WTF does ANY car need 36 speakers for unless you're doing SPL? And trust me...no Blose will not be doing any competitions any time soon.

Point is, ANYONE can do MUCH BETTER with pretty much any aftermarket 6-8 speakers and a sub with a low to medium powered amp.

 

Has anyone tried playing DSD files off a thumb drive in a C8?

 

I would put my '69 VW up against any C8, 10 speakers, or 14 speakers, or 114 speakers!

A custom built and installed 9 speaker (Kicker) system, with Alpine electronics / amplification. 2 speakers in each door panel, 5 speakers in the rear shelf including a 10" sub. It sounded 10 times better than my wife's E300 Mercedes-Benz factory sound system (Blaupunkt).

GM needs to fire Bose, seriously. The Bose system in my C4 sucked...totally.

 

Tell us how you really feel

 

Lighten up Francis. No need getting your panties in a bunch!

 

Attribute some of that to the interior of my coupe being sooo much quitter! With my C7 Z51 and C7 Grand Sport had the sound system playing fairly loud to drown out tire and road noise. The system came on when I started the car playing >1000 songs from a thumb drive. Seldom had a passenger and my phone is set not to receive calls or foolish text beeps when driving - so it was seldom off!

The C8 is so quite even my wife enjoys driving in it where she rightfully thought the C7s were too noisy. When she is in the car have to drive with the sound system off!

I recall Tadge told Bose when they said they were limiting the max volume he asked if it were for sound quality, they said no, He said let the customer decide! Yep IF parked with the engine off (the only way you can tell) the system sounds fine even with a high volume bass (as high as I can tolerate!) Now if listening to Rap music and want the doors to rattle- can do that! But it's silly to say you can build a better system, IMO. Even if parked Bose had done a fine job with the limited speaker size you can stuff in that small area. Yep and I have the 14 balanced as best I can get.

Now if you can fit a large subwoofer and a separate high output amp as I stuffed into the "sound wall' in my tubbed Street Rod you can do better. Have to design the proper enclosure as I have done from the early 1960's! Also built a properly sized enclosure and added an amp to power the one I installed in my none extended cab S-10! BUT neither come close to a quality sound system in a proper room! And can't compare anything in a car to the new Performing Arts Center in town!

Top pics the "Sound Wall" built to substitute for the rear seat. That setback 8.2 Liter BB and front seats with wheel tubs for the very wide tires left no room for a seat! Bottom pic is the properly sized enclosure built for my non extended car S-10 with amp mounted on the cab wall!

 

I ripped CDs to 320 kbps FLAC files. Had some Nav SD card conflicts at first causing the Nav system to not work and requiring a reboot. A couple of threads on the topic. This appears to have subsided, but I occasionally have the system not recognize the thumb drive. I just remove and reinsert it after restarting the car. Aside from this, I am very happy with the system. And I've had custom audio installs in the past.

 

I have listened to Sirius for years and this sound system makes it sound like AM radio. Try a higher bitrate sound source.

 

Try using a free higher bitrate music service.