"William R. Walsh" m
wrote in message news:i%CRi.160223$Fc.108524@attbi_s21...

The Wave system (which I've heard) is a profoundly mediocre product
sold at a premium price.

Premium price? Oh, yeah. Absolutely. (At least to my way of thinking...)

Mediocre product? Well, I suppose it depends on what you have in mind
when you listen to music. The first time I had the chance to hear one was
at a friend's house. I walked in the door, far away from the room in which
it was playing and was immediately surprised.

This has nothing to do with the quality of the Wave system. It's a
well-known psychoacoustic effect -- almost any audio system sounds better
_outside_ the room in which it's playing than in the room. I have theories
about this, but I won't speculate.


I didn't remember any big stereo ever being in the place, and one wasn't.
The music was coming from this little Bose Wave player. I was astounded
by the performance, but the price and the fact that new ones have only
remote controls put me off of it.

For what a Wave CD/radio system costs, you can buy high-quality components
with _much_ better sound. That's what makes the Wave system such a ripoff --
people think they're getting great sound and good value, when they're
actually getting mediocre sound and paying three times what it _should_
cost.


Tivoli Audio's little table radio sounds fairly good to me and the price
was
a lot better. The company was also good to deal with, although I wanted
to keep the flood damaged unit I had and build a plywood cabinet for it,
just to be funny.

I bought a Tivoli Model One when they first came out. It was Henry Kloss's
last product, so it must be great, right?

It wasn't. The bass was thick and thumpy. (Stuffing the port helps.) It
won't play very loud without sounding "gagged". And it One sounds better at
a distance.

I just sold two KLH Model Eight table radios. Despite the fact that the
Eight was designed 45 years earlier, the overall sound is much better. It
has a fullness and "projection" missing from the One.