Bose 901

Back in the late 80's while stationed in Germany, I went to a party in Shape, Belgium where the DJ was blasting a pair of 901's that sounded like crap because he was using an EQ other than the Bose EQ.  I asked him why; he said he did not need it and completely dismissed my suggestion that he get one.  Many people made that same mistake, and then complained about the 901 SQ; other's have one and still complain :-).  

For "critical" listening, I'd position my 901's facing and parallel to the back walls about 36" from the both the back and side walls.  The music filled the room and sounded great!  When partying, I'd turn the speakers around and blast away.  I got that idea from a friend who owned a club where he had a pair of Bose 802's sitting on the high stands.  The 802 speakers are designed to face the listener.  They were being pushed by a professional grade Peavy 500 wpc power amp and Peavy mixer, and this huge base speaker.  On the dance floor, the sound was awesome.  Loud enough to party to, but at a volume where you could have a conversation at the tables and bar area.

As i noted earlier in this thread, "... back in the 80's and 90's, I was in stereo heaven" with my 901's.  

I purchased the 901s in 1976.  They were my first good speakers.  I really liked them but the equalizer was confusing and I felt like I had to play them very loud to get all the music I wanted. They did look spiffy though. 

I worked for a high end store in the 70's and the owner decided to try out the Bose lineup. Our showroom was not a favorable place for the 901s. There was a large window in the front of the store that ended up being where we put these things. They still sounded terrible, just not as terrible. I thought the 301 was the only decent sounding speaker in the line. We also sold Sonab for awhile. They were much better than the Bose and appealed to the person who was looking for a different design.

Although I never cared for their sound, I couldn't get over how many people would turn them around and face the multi driver side towards the listening position. Totally defeated the direct/reflect sound concept.

The monster Bose power amp MC refered to was 250 WPC, not 350 (that was the Fizzle Linear at 350), and it featured a distortion curve that rose steadily above the upper midrange, no doubt due to minimal open-loop bandwidth limitations on the output transistors.  But with no actual tweeters...who cares!  But it was a beast.  After Series III came out they stopped making it.