Bose 901

In the early 80's while stationed in Germany, I purchased a pair of original 901's with the EQ and chrome stands.  At the time, my system consisted of a Pioneer SPEC-4 power amp, SoundCraftsman SP-4001 EQ/pre amp, Technics SL-1600MK2 TT, Pioneer PL-1000 TT, dbx3bx range expander, dbx224 noise reduction unit, Teac X-10R R2R, and Rodec mixer.  I thought the 901's sounded great, especially when playing my R2R.  

As a side note, I still have all of my 80's gear, except the 901's and Pioneer TT.  I gave the 901's, EQ, and stands; a modern receiver; and a Raspberry PI DAC to my goddaughter as a birthday present.  My current Tannoy speakers blow them away, but back in the 80's and 90's, I was in stereo heaven.

The 901's certainly didn't need 350 watts to drive them. I always thought Bose is overpriced/mediocre equipment. Still do. Years ago, just being curious, I purchased a used pair of Series 3 with stands and EQ. I discovered that the foam surrounds were completely deteriorated and replaced them with new surrounds. I just wanted to see how good these speakers were since their retail price (new) was so high at the time.
For a short time I listened to the speakers with my 12 band EQ connected. I thought the dinky little Bose EQ couldn't come close to my much superior EQ. One day I connected the Bose EQ and the difference was night and day. The Bose EQ is a VERY important part of the 901 sound and using them without it is a waste of time. Of course, taking these speakers seriously is a waste of time. Equipment far superior to Bose at a fraction of their cost is plentiful.

I had a pair of the more conventional 501’s but lusted after the 901’s.
We’ve come a long way baby!

The Series I (“9 Rave Reviews!!”) were just getting the Bose propaganda machine warmed up.  Series II are the ones to look for. They had the drivers custom made, not off the shelf as in S I.  Yes they needed power because of the steep bass boost.  To make them more commercially viable Series III brought in the use of injection molded plastic cabinets and vented loading, and entirely different EQ shape. They were no longer remotely interesting and have remained so, IMO. 

@millercarbon............

Were they successful?

So you really don’t know then? Okay.

The Bose 901 was introduced in 1968. Back then we didn’t have anything like the standards we do today. Nowadays when someone says however many watts we know (or being audiophiles at any rate we should know) it means not instantaneous peak watts but continuous RMS watts and not only that but it was measured after a prescribed warm up period and not only that but had to be able to put out the measured watts for an extended period of time. All this we take for granted today.

None of this we had back in the 60’s. What we had back then was all kinds of power claims, which if measured at all were mere brief pulses, whatever they could do to get a big number, because then as now the average audiophool was easily misled by numbers.

I’m spending all this time painting a picture because today we look at something like a 6 watt triode like its nothing when back in the 50’s and 60’s that was big, big power. Serious power. Even today, with K-horns it will blow your mind.

Bose however did not have Paul Klipsch. They had whoever it was thought it would be a good idea to throw sound up against a wall and see what sticks, er I mean bounces back. They had just about the most inefficient loudspeaker ever made. And yes I know about the German robot thing, that’s why I said just about.

So Bose had this hopelessly inefficient speaker and it was all they had and so in order to make the 901 not quite so hopelessly lame they made this awesome 350 WPC amp and went on tour around the country, which is where I came in. Because one day the traveling Bose show made it all the way to Puyallup High in Puyallup, Washington and we got out of class and had our little minds blown by this guy playing music in our concert hall and it was really good and really loud. For back then anyway. Nothing back then rates today, except maybe the girls, but even they are hotter now too so nevermind.

Now Bose may have been dumb enough to make speakers bounce sound off walls but the guy they sent on the road was smart enough to know to point the 8 out into the audience. And to put the amp on stage. Which me and my audio pal Doug then drove to Tacoma to see close up. 350 watts! Per channel!

Silly idea. Dumbest thing you can do, make a speaker so inefficient. Second dumbest, make an amp that powerful. But yeah. They did.

Were they successful? Well, do you see them making that amp today? Hard even to find any record of it. So after all that I would be inclined to say, no. But at least now you know where I was coming from.