BOSE(R) Lifestyle 48 Series IV DVD Home Entertainment System - Black

I live in a high rise condo and hence a system with small footprint, but good sound quality for movies and cable was very important. I have the following sources feeding into the Bose 48 system:

1. LG BH 200 Blu Ray/DVD Player
2. Apple TV
3. Cox HD DVR
4. Polk Xrt 12 XM radio
5. Sony Digital Photo Album (not used much after getting Apple TV).

PROS:

1. Accepts a wide variety of audio formats
2. uMusic music playback quality is excellent since it preserves the original CD quality.
3. AdaptIQ really makes the sound all enveloping in my living room/dining room where it is set up.
4. Runs cool and hence can be placed inside a cabinet with no problems.
5. Super reliable and operating it, even with all the systems feeding it is easy.
6. Sound stage is impressive and both movies (I watch mainly Apple TV HD content and Blu Ray sound great).
7. Nice, small footprint speakers.
8. Nice thumping bass (the Acoustimass speaker has to be place correctly for best impact).
9. Tremendous flexibility when it comes to speaker placement.

CONS:

1. Video switching for component and s-video work fine with my VS-2 Video enhancer. However, the hdmi is flaky when connected to my Pioneer display (handshake issue - and therefore I am connecting my Blu Ray and Cable box video directly to the display (hdmi) and not going through the Bose 48 system. Apple TV is connected via component and connected via the Bose and it works fine.

2. When connected via hdmi, the DVD upscaling on the Bose is very good. However, the default connection (via component) is so so. Since I use my LG BH 200 to play both DVD and Blu Ray, it is not an issue for me. But when upscaled via HDMI, the DVD playback was very close to my Oppo DVD Player - which is often considered to be one of the best. In fact, once I saw the upscaling, I took out the Oppo from my system. However, the Oppo does play DVD-A and DVDs from other region.

3. At this price, Bose should have included DVD-A and SACD playback as well.

4. The analog inputs should have supported 5.1 (instead of just 2.0). I am using digital coax and optical because of this limitation. HDMI is for video only.

Given the overall performance of this system, the solid reliability and Bose customer support I give this a 4 star. The sound quality is far superior to the Sony 5.1 system that it replaced - by a big margin.

I bought my Lifestyle 48 a little over one year ago. The system sounds and works great and I enthusiastically give it a 5 star rating.

Setup was a breeze. I agree with much of what Philippe "Phil Reviewer of things" said in his review. I am using Comcast cableTV and had no problems connecting the system to my Sony XBR using the VS-2 video enhancer. The Lifestyle 48 system includes a setup disk that automatically calibrates each speaker and subwoofer to 5 locations in your room to ensure the audio is optimal. The system delivers stunning sound, with great depth and realistic, distortion-free surround sound. If possible, you should really demo the Bose speakers in the quiet comfort of a Bose store. Don't believe everything you read in these reviews. You really need to personally experience the clarity and crispness of the jewel speakers and just-right, undistorted bass. Decide with your ears. I did and after researching and listening to many other systems costing more and less I found the Bose Lifestyle 48 out performed them all. My only disappointment was the Lifestyle DVD player. After I got the Sony XBR HD TV, the "regular" DVD player in the Lifestyle 48 produced expected average picture quality. For little money (not sure yet which direction HD DVD tech is going) I purchased a 1080p Upscaling DVD player with HDMI output which looks much better. I use the DVD-CD player in the Bose mainly to store new CD's. (The new systems have offer the upgraded DVD player)

To date, I have loaded over 200 CD's. I have not encountered any hardware of software problems. The Bose uMusic "artificial intelligence" approach to cataloging music, customizable genre presets and nicely detailed music library information database, and a long list of other usable features really make this system a joy to use. I recently added a Boselink AL8 wireless "transmitter" to the Lifestyle 48 and a Wave radio with an AL8 "receiver". I use the Wave radio in my bedroom, one floor above where I have my Lifestyle 48 system. Using the Personal music center II remote control (the one with the small LCD screen) I can access my music library on my Lifestyle 48 system from my bedroom and play it back through the Wave radio. The AL8 transmitter can accommodate a total of 14 remote (receiver) locations.

The Bose Lifestyle 48 is a great surround sound audio system. It's customizable and expandable to meet just about anyone's need. Bose offers excellent quality and stands behind their product. I purchased my Bose equipment from their store in Columbia, MD. These folks are knowledgable, friendly, professional, and true audio "geeks" who love everything audio-visual and are there to show you Bose technology, and answer your questions not just sale you stuff. Over the past year, I have made routine and not-so-routine calls to Bose tech support and they have always provide excellent, patient service.

Can't complain about the sound that this system puts out, it's great. However, one of the strong selling points of the system is the flexibility that the VS-2 video enhancer provides, which comes with several of the Lifestyle systems.

The concept of the VS-2 sounds great, but in my configuration, it's a paper weight. I have a DirecTv HD-DVR, which can output video from 480i to 1080i. However, when I hook up HDMI from the DVR to the VS-2, and HDMI from the VS-2 to the television, the only way I can get the video signal to the TV is to configure the HD-DVR to put out 480i. So, I basically have to have the HD-DVR downgrade 1080i shows to 480i, just to have the VS-2 upgrade it back. I will have to resort to using composite video from the VS-2 to the television (though I have not tried this yet)to get things to work right. Not using the VS-2 is out of the question, as I can't see the Lifestyle 48's controls (i.e. music library listing, etc...) without it. I tried to argue with the Bose installer about the HDMI incompatibility, but he said not to worry about it, and use Component video, which he said offers a much better video signal than HDMI (ya right).

So, I give it 4 stars for sound, 1 star for video, and a -1 star for false advertising regarding the VS-2 (and the installer giving me false information to make the VS-2 work)

I bought this item about 18 months ago and honestly I think I wasted my $4000
- sound system is not any different than other systems that cost only $400-$500
- it does not have HDMI connection
- remote control is terrible and designed very poorly
- you can't categorize your music easily.
- You have to have your TV on to see your sound collection which is very bad design and not user friendly.
- when you send email or contact Bose, they do not even reply.

Please DO NOT WASTE your money, You can easily buy a better system under $1000.