8 out of 8 people found this review helpful.
Looks like I need to work on it a little...
Date of Review: Feb 4, 2003
The Bottom Line: As a first experience in HT Systems, 321 is definitely a good choice. Price is high, but for Bose you have to pay. needs a little work on sound.
Bought (and we pay it quite a lot more here in Italy) and brought home. Opened the box and, well, we've been surprised by the all round quality of the package itself, being used to the asian market leaflets and no gadgets policy. But ok, we've bought a Usa product (even if it's produced in Mexico and Ireland, btw).
Set up was virtually flawless. I would have had more informations BEFORE going to the shop, anyway: whan I bought it I was assuming (poor boy) the 321 was also capable of managing video. Not at all: after desperately trying to squeeze the video informations though the audio optical inputs (lol) I had a mystical satori and understood my error. Maybe Bose could have been more informative on the box, but it was my fault not asking the salesman.
Once made the right connections, I had wires all over the place but my Bose was ready to begin. My first experience was a CD (pop music: Depeche Mode's Violator). The sound was really disappointing: poor in low freqs, scretchy in highs. And the mids were virtually no-present. Then I tried an action DVD (Ronin... my french places) and had the same feeling: something was really wrong with my 321. Or Bose had produced its first piece of crap.
But I was wrong. The Ad claim here in Italy is something like "all the Home Cinema you need in 1/2 hour work... no wires, no problems and all the famous Bose sound". Reality IS different: this system need a little work to sound properly. FIRST, you need to be really clever in placing the satellites: you absolutely have to avoid directionality. The satellites MUST NOT be directed towards the listener. SECOND, you have to place the Acoustimass module (alas, the SW) in the right place: if you need a good midrange and bass performance you HAVE to place it in a room's corner. Otherwise, you'll have a flat response. THIRD, you need to play a little with the treble and bass controls of the 321 set: in my house I had to low the trebles to avoid the terrible "squawk-box" sound that was coming out of the satellites.
After a 2-hours soundcheck, the improvement is amazing. Even glueing the little gummy pads under the satellites was worth the time: I avoided them to rattle on the alu shelves of my bookcase. I guess I'm only half the way, but this morning I've listened to a good performance of Holst's The Planets (Karayan, 1981) and I had, well, good feelings.
As for the radio, setting up is quite easy and fast. Station sensitivity is good enough to be able to hear the best stations: station separation is average. RDS is a nice help to the lazy people like me, who never remember their favorite station's frequency.
Wires: only three, but they are thick as fingers (expecially the SW one). Hope I will be managing them better in the next two or three days, hiding them behind a layer of books...
I still have to link and try my XBox: I needed the optical audio wire Bose DON'T put in the box. But I've bought it today, so it will be done in hours.
